If you missed out on going to FISM this year, you'll be able to get a little taste of it courtesy of a TV special which should start airing around the world before Christmas. Previews of the show are already available on YouTube here.

One of the most memorable things about FISM 2006, for all the wrong reasons, was the announcement that the next FISM would be held in Beijing, China. Eric Eswin, Secretary General of FISM, made the announcement at the Friday night Banquet and, after initial cheers a section of the crowd responded with long and loud booing and hissing.

To me, this was extremely disrespectful and offensive behaviour. Three countries bid for the right to hold FISM 2009. All three used different lobbying tactics, offering appealing venues and facilities, two (China and Granada) even flew FISM Presidents in to their countries to inspect their facilities. Some people have suggested there were "behind the scenes politics" involved by some countries to ensure they got the votes of the FISM Presidents.

Regardless of rumours and allegations, the bottom line was that it was up to the FISM Presidents to decide where they wanted to be in 2009. Even if one country gave each President $1000 per vote, the ballot was held in secret so the Presidents could vote for whomever they liked best and no-one would know.

In the end China won the vote by a very big majority. Yet some people in the crowd were, basically, very sore losers and instead of congratulating China on it's win decided to rain on their parade.

However, the repercussions have extended far beyond that "emotional" display of poor sportsmanship. The magic forums are filled with comments like:

"Sounds like a great reason to go to China... if by then they stop clubbing dogs to death in their cities."

"Just ask the millions of Chinese in re-education camps making Nike for .50 a pair. I bet they are thrilled to have FISM."

"Regarding China winning the votes.... I have had a few folks suggest to me that they probably "bribed" many of those voting in some form."

"China of course being one of the largest, if not the largest, source of pirated movies and software. That's in addition of course to the way they treat their people, and the environment. Recall Tiannamen Square."

I was speaking to another magician this morning who couldn't believe that all of this was going on. He asked "Isn't magic supposed to bring people together?" Theoretically, yes. But it seems that for some people not all magicians are welcome in our little community.

In my opinion, there are some valid arguments for and against each FISM 2009 candidate city, Governmental politics however, are not. Some magicians refuse to go to China because of its human rights record (that's their choice not to attend, but why should the Chinese magicians be punished for this? Haven't they suffered enough at the hands of their own government? Or is it the fact that the government is supporting China's FISM bid that justifies the anger towards the Chinese magicians?). I have heard the same type of arguments being used against Vienna as a host city. (Because of some Austrian politicians connections with the Nazi party, many magicians feel Vienna has no right to host FISM).

One legitimate reason against Beijing hosting is that it may well suffer the fate of FISM in Japan and have a low attendance because many magicians simply won't be able to afford the airfares. (Of course, for many non-European magicians it will be cheaper than flying to Europe and Beijing have promised very special low airfares with it's partner airlines).

Another valid argument is the reputation China has as being the country responsible for producing the most magic "rip-offs". Obviously it's impossible for the magic group hosting FISM 2009 to force these companies to shut down their factories as most have nothing to do with the magic community. However, China can and needs to re-educate it's magicians that rip-offs are simply not acceptable. In fact it's even in the FISM charter that FISM stands against rip-offs. Magicians are right to worry that the Dealers Room may be filled with rip-off manufacturers (and China has assured us that this won't be the case) or that the theatres will be filled with magicians secretly videotaping other people's acts (in Stockholm they caught 27 people doing this!) Do we give them the benefit of a doubt and take China at it's word that they will try to prevent this? Our FISM Presidents have decided to and we need to support this decision.

I liken it to a father who's teenage daughter is being taken out on a date by a new boy. He requests that she is brought home by midnight and, if she isn't, that boy better have a good explanation or he won't be welcomed back into the family.

Thankfully, some other magicians on the forums seem to think the same way:

"As for the China vote I would have preferred Vienna, one of my favorite cities, but, as Tim said, the vote was made and, for whatever reason China was chosen (the suggestion of corruption in politic ... surely not lol) so get past it. Booing and bad behavior won't change anything."

"I didn't like it when Eric Eswin was booed and I didn't like it when China was announced as the winner and several loud people booed and whistled. There is no excuse for that kind of behavior from so-called grown-ups. (Though we are talking about magicians, after all)."

I've finally had a few moments to put Sue-Anne's FISM 2006 Competition Report on it's permanent home on our website. This page will probably have little additions and alterations made to it over the next few weeks or so, but if you want to pass the link on to friends, it's http://www.magicunlimited.com/fism_2006.htm

Thanks to VistaPhotoAgency we've been able to add some photos of the competitors as well. If you haven't visited their site yet you MUST! The photos they took are absolutely sensational and must be seen in full size to really appreciate them.

Well we made it through security here at Heathrow with no hassles, though I had to check my carry-on bag because it's too big now and Sue-Anne couldn't bring any make-up, toothpaste or water in her carry-on, and we both had to remove our shoes, belts, jackets and get patted-down in security. (Though, they didn't pat me down... I guess when they saw me standing there in my shirt and pants they could see I had nothing to hide... hmmm).

Anyway, just thought I'd fill in some of our 5 hour wait in the BA Lounge by telling you about a chat we had with Noel Britten last night in Bath (and we'll tell you about the brilliant Bizarre Bath Tour later!).

We were discussing the difficult viewing circumstances for close-up at FISM and Noel said that they really should use 6 rooms with a judge in each room and the performers repeat their acts 6 times.

Such a sensible idea, one that is used in conventions all over the world.

It doesn't need to be 6 rooms... even 3 would be a vast improvement on the viewing conditions we currently suffer through at every FISM.

It would also be a GREAT way to present the Close Up Gala Show at FISM too. Three rooms, the performers rotate and repeat. Every gets a better view...

Mr Jacoby performed a 1970’s style parody pantomime complete with light up pants and platform boots. The act began with a D’Lite routine and juggling with red light-up balls to funky 70’s music, followed by just about every variation of the Dancing Hanky routine. Although his character work could have been stronger, the act was loud and brash which suited the style. The character vanished towards the end of the act, (unfortunately the black art method was inadvertently exposed), and reappeared still dancing energetically to 70’s music in a picture frame (an interesting use of an LCD screen), then finally re-entered the stage on a motorbike for the finale. Recovering well from a little fall off the stage in all the excitement, Mr Jacoby succeeded in warming up the audience.

2

Eduardo Kozuch

Invention

Argentina

Sponsor – Rudyard Magaldi (Circolo Magico Argentino)

DISQUALIFIED

The first invention is simply a modified Sanada Gimmick rather than a new invention. It was shown adding live fish to a bowl of water and then used for an orange juice production. The second invention was an ‘any card at any number’ effect with jumbo cards. Eduardo was explaining the workings of this effect when he was disqualified for running over time. It looked as though his table was blocking his view of the warning light.

3

Janis

Parlour Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Janis acted as a narrator and used magic to tell a tale about a mysterious dream. The audience played the citizens of Marakesh. He produced a lantern from a large silk, then produced a candle from the silk. A thread (flash string) was lit to produce a spool of string, then he did a Gypsy Thread routine. He put the silk into an empty box and produced 1 die, then 6 dice, then 12 dice and proceeded to play a game of chance with the dice (Cubalibra effect). A silk was produced from a tray, all dice stacks vanished. Standard tricks with a few nice twists.

4

Monsieur Brezelberger

Parlour Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

This was a speaking comedy act using a volunteer. It looked like a parody of MagicSports where the volunteer chooses the set up for the trick. The trick involved having to use a number of elements to create an effect. As an example, the cards the volunteer first chose from his change bag meant that the performer had to do a trick like a dead fish tap dancing in the science fiction genre with a handicap of fake breasts. Instead, he ended up doing a trick where he had to goldplate a watch. A rat in a trap was used for a rope tie escape. If it sounds confusing, it was…and we never saw the conclusion to the act because he was disqualified for going overtime.

5

Shawn Farquhar

Parlour Magic

Canada

Sponsor – Joan Caesar (Association Canadienne De Magiciens)

An extremely well rehearsed card trick using a heart shaped projection screen to allow the audience to see the clever card manipulation filmed live on camera. A sealed regular deck of cards was used, unwrapped for a spectator to select a card. Before selecting a card, one Joker and two advertising cards were thrown away. 53 cards remained. A card was selected and signed by the volunteer and returned to the deck. The card manipulation was performed like ballet in the hands to the music ‘Shape OfMy Heart’ by Sting. A story was told in the song and echoed in the card moves. The spectator’s card was featured throughout the routine as was a King which became half-faded. After the song had finished, Shawn threw the Joker away and the spectator’s card was instantly back in the sealed deck which was then opened in front of the spectator. There were 52 cards in order including the faded King and the spectator’s signed card, all of which were given to the spectator as a souvenir. A fabulous act. (Shawn received equal second place with this act in Parlour Magic FISM 2003).

6

Toritto

General Magic

Japan

Sponsor – Maki Kitami (Japanese Professional Magicians Association)

Toritto drank from a wine glass. Two glasses were then produced, then three. Silks were produced. From a silk, a bottle of wine was produced, then a colour changing liquid routine followed. Toritto poured yellow liquid into his fists and changed it into a yellow silk. He poured more liquid into his fist and produced a yellow ball, followed by ball manipulation and a multiplying ball routine where the balls changed colours. Some nice moves. A ball was placed in a glass with a wine to confetti production. Then more and more glasses were produced to conclude the act.

7

Wooki (Replacing Peter York who was listed in the programme)

General Magic

Republic of Korea

Sponsor – Eun-Sung Chung (Korean Magic Society)

Wooki began her act with a hat stand and a table adorned with feminine props. She showed a magazine with a large photo of a pearl necklace and plucked one of the pearls from the picture for a ball manipulation routine. The ball turned into a silk, then instantly there were four balls and then eight in her hands. She took a ball and shrunk it until it was small, she split it into two balls that became her pearl earrings. Flash string to pearl necklace. She ponders herself in a mirror, the mirror turned to fire producing flowers. Her makeup turned to streamers which turned to more flowers. She made a silk transform into more flowers and took a hat from her hat stand. From the hat, she produces two more bunches of flowers. Wooki took a skirt that was hanging up and turned it into a carpet for a bride to walk on. She did an instant change into a bride’s dress and walked down the aisle with another bunch of flowers, then threw her bouquet out to the audience.

8

Cengiz

General Magic

Turkey

Sponsor – Roger Miller (International Brotherhood of Magicians)

An act suitable for very young children rather than FISM which featured Axtel’s “Vern the Bird” puppet playing the mischief making half of the act. Unfortunately, only a few very simple tricks were performed like the Double Colour Changing Silks, a rope that goes stiff, a rose trick and a short egg bag routine. The bird ate an egg and produced it from where a bird produces eggs and flash string was used to produce a pop of confetti to conclude the act.

9

Rey Ben

Parlour Magic

Argentina

Sponsor – Rudyard Magaldi (Circolo Magico Argentino)

This was essentially the same act Rey performed in close-up act at FISM 1994 in Yokohama. Rey entered carrying a baby doll he said was his son and he had to look after him. The doll cried, Rey quietened it by balancing it on two small chairs that he took away from underneath it, finally levitating the doll from side to side. The baby doll cried again and Rey consoled it this time with a bottle of milk that changed to a beer bottle, which was in turn crushed like rubbish in a paper bag. A newspaper trick followed. Baby doll cried again, this time the Rey used a pacifier that ended up in his mouth instead of the doll’s mouth. A ring on rope routine was used to amuse the baby doll. The baby pooed in it’s nappy, Rey panicked and covered it with a black cloth. The baby disappeared and the table transformed into a cot with the baby inside it. A newspaper to baby blanket trick became a ‘zombie baby’routine and Rey ran off stage behind the floating baby doll. This was a very energetic act.

10

Radini

Manipulation

Norway

Sponsor – Rudyard Magaldi (Magiske Cirkel Norge)

A standard card manipulation act performed to jazz piano bar music. Clean moves, little exposure. The act included a small card fan turning into a normal size card fan. Card productions were one handed and neat. A large silk was wound up and cut in two, thrown in the air and restored. Radini then performed a cigarette production and manipulation routine which included one being sniffed up his nose, returned and put in mouth, then vanished. A cigarette to cigar move concluded the act.

11

I.Ma.Gi.A

Stage Illusions

Italy

Sponsor – Domenico Dante (Club Magico Italiano)

Comedy. Removal boxes were labeled in different ways ‘Light’, ‘Heavy’, ‘Do Not Touch’, ‘Keep’, ‘Together’. As the two removalists started moving the boxes various actions take place like fire in one box, the flames being doused with a production of a fish bowl full of water. The ‘Light’ box was heavy while the ‘Heavy’ box was covered with an ‘Air Mail’ cloth and ‘zombied’. They separated the ‘Keep’ and ‘Together’ boxes, one vanished and reappeared. One removalist smoked a cigarette over the ‘Danger’ and ‘Explosives’ boxes. The ‘Danger’ box rattled ominously and exploded into cubes that couldn’t have all fit in the box. The best and most deceptive part of the act was the finale when a large box over a crate sitting on brick stands was levitated. Whilst levitating, the box was opened at the top and a girl was shown inside. The box was closed and levitated upside down and hands appeared out of the box at the bottom. The box was levitated the right way up again and the girl was shown in the box again, looking as light as a feather. Then, the girl got out of the box that was still floating! The box was placed back down on the crate when a lion’s roar was heard. The young lady’s Italian mama climbed out of the box also, grabbed the girl by the arm and, waving her rolling pin in the air, chased the two removalists off stage.

12

Sebastian Nicolas

Manipulation

Germany

Sponsor – Wolgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Sebastian produced a clock that changed to confetti. He performed ball manipulation, then threw the ball into the air and it turned into a clock as it landed in his hand. A red ball turned into a silk, another clock was produced, vanished, reappeared then he did a manipulation routine with it. A clock turned into a silk and in turn Sebastian produced a clock with it. A clock turned into a playing card and he produced cards that were held in his hand like a ‘flower’ basket. Card manipulation followed and the cards were flicked from his fingers and vanished into confetti. Neat, clean productions. A flash, then a clock appeared and continued into a clock production. Clocks were featured on Sebastian’s display stand which was then turned into a large ‘egg timer’ (a clock with falling sand).

13

Eduardo Kozuch

Mental Magic

Argentina

Sponsor – Rudyard Magaldi (Circolo Magico Argentino)

Eduardo was a psychic policeman and three young people were the volunteers. One volunteer was roped into being a security guard. The other two were shoplifters. Two identical sets of cards with supermarket products were shuffled and the security guard volunteer selected three cards as did Eduardo who ‘divined’ what the volunteer was going to choose. Two out of three pairs were identical, the last pair was (deliberately) wrong. A box full of supermarket items was shown and the last card put into it along with the volunteers FISM I.D. card. The two ‘shoplifters’ had to each steal a product from the box…and Eduardo psychically told them what they stole. We never found out the ending to the act since Eduardo ran overtime and was disqualified. He could definitely see the yellow warning light letting him know he needed to bring his act to an end, but he continued regardless and was disqualified as he was earlier in the day.The volunteers were given the whole box of supermarket products to keep because they ‘did so well’.

14

Ted Louis

General Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Ted started out looking like a wind-up mannequin then did an instant costume change to become a modern person in street clothes. There was CD automation (a CD machine that worked by itself to play modern music. Sunglasses were produced, another quick costume change (to red vest, white shirt, striped pants and boater hat) to become a dancing man who produced lots of sand from his hands. Ted did another instant costume change to top hat and tails. He produced a pink girl’s outfit and placed it on a hat stand which then resembled a lady. The music changed to a classical number and Ted proceeded to dance with the ‘lady’ by levitating the stand with the costume ‘zombie’ style. Again, another instant costume change to a fluorescent yellow tight lycra outfit, then he produced a real lady and danced with her. She did an instant costume change into a matching yellow outfit by having only a hoop with short streamers attached to it moved up her body. There was very little coverage for the costume change and unfortunately it was exposed.

15

Karch

Mental Magic

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Dale Hindman (Academy of Magical Arts)

Comedy parapsychology. Karch threw eight balls with ESP symbols all over them into the audience. The volunteers had to choose an ESP symbol and burn a good mental image of it into their minds. They were given bells to hold for later. More volunteers on stage had cards to shuffle with ESP symbols on them. As the ESP symbols on the bottom of each pile of shuffled cards were shown, the volunteers in the audience had to ring their bell when their ESP symbol was shown and Karch had to divine which ESP symbol belonged to which volunteer in the audience. Karch got 7 out of 8 correct.

16

Julien

Stage Illusion/Invention

Sweden

Sponsor – Dag Lofalk (Svensk Magisk Cirkel)

An illusion built to resemble a large ice cube sat in the middle of the stage. Fire broke out inside it, smoke filled up the interior, the sides of the ‘ice cube’ chamber cracked and broke open to reveal the magician. He produced a dove and the dove was placed inside a large bird cage. Another dove appeared in the cage, and another. Three doves were in the cage and a cloth was placed over the cage briefly to reveal a girl inside the cage wearing an outfit reminiscent of a dove (white and shiny with large capes attached to her arms). Julien did an instant costume change into a white outfit to match the girl. The girl left the stage, but she returned to the stage covered by her capes. Julien whipped the cape away to reveal not the girl but a ‘grim reaper’ character who chained Julien up and put him under the table which was the base of the bird cage illusion. The table was set on fire (reminiscent of a burning altar). The fire exploded, the ‘reaper’ covered the fire and took away the sides of the illusion to reveal not Julien, but a dove. The ‘reaper’ turned out to be Julien and the girl appeared in the audience. The ice cube illusion was quite effective.

17

Gaston

Parlour Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

A chair was lit by a single spot light. Gaston slowly walked over to it and took off his coat, placed it over the chair and introduced himself as ‘Gunter” as he fumbled for his cigarettes, announcing that he attends “Magician’s Anonymous” and admitted to everyone how things just ‘happen’ after he was exposed to his first trick and how his subsequent addiction lead to his life-ruining downfall. This was an absolutely fabulous piece of clever theatre with magic ‘accidentally’ happening throughout his monologue, such as sniffing a cigarette up his nose and vanishing, thimble to wine bottle and back to thimbles appearing and disappearing, changing colour, all thimbles ending up on every finger. He spoke about his ‘magic related crimes’ such as birthday parties to corporate shows because he needs the money to buy more magic tricks or topits (spoken as he vanished another object). He said he joined a therapy group called the Flicking Fingers. He said his wife left him after he gave his six year old son a magic set for Christmas. Then he went into the gutter when he became a restaurant magician. He asked the audience if they wanted to see him demonstrate an invisible pass with his deck of cards, vanishing the deck he says ‘it’s impossible, because they’re invisible’. Gunter ended up a total anxious wreck by the end of his ‘confession’ as chaos reigned, props popping out of his jacket and ended in a snowstorm and confetti explosion. Very clever and very funny! He received a standing ovation. (Gaston also competed at FISM 1997 and again in 2000 with Thomas Fraps and Mr Punch where they received equal third place).

18

Gennady Palchevsky

General Magic

Latvia

Sponsor – Jerry Stanek (Krajowy Klub Illuzjonistow)

Three picture frames (for oil paintings) on stage and classical music playing. The picture frames were LCD screens. Gennady lit a candle but was interrupted by a bottle rolling onto the stage. Gennady did an instant costume change into modern clothes and a change of music he juggled the bottle, produced a glass and a shaker that turned into a ball. The ball turned to confetti then he produced and juggled lemons. All the while the magician performed, the three LCD picture frames echoed what Gennady was doing with incredible moving graphics. For example: when the magician played with lemons, then lemons would be featured in the screens like a funky video clip, bouncing all over the screens). The whole scene was very interesting to watch but as a result, the technology detracted from the magic because the screens were a tremendous distraction and the magic was lost. The rest of the act included card manipulation, more juggling with a Galliano bottle produced from a silk and ened in two silver shower pyros (which were also echoed in the LCD screens).

19

Andrely

Manipulation

Portugal

Sponsor – Paschoal Ammirati (Associaciao Portugesa De Illusionismo)

This act included producing a bird from fire, a red silk and cane to produce a small cage and a dove. A cane turned into a multi-coloured silk streamer, the production of another coloured silk, another bird and two eggs. Egg manipulation followed, then a blue silk was produced which was used to vanish a ball and bring it back, flaming sticks, another dove production with one dove becoming two, flash string to candle to light a cigarette. He then did a card fan production, plucked individual cards from the air, another card fan and more cards from air. A black cloth turned into an umbrella, a white silk produced multiplying cards that ended in a dove appearance. The dove was thrown into air and turned into confetti. Clean moves.

The scene opened on a park bench and a garbage bin beside it with rubbish strewn everywhere. A passerby walked towards the garbage on the floor, picked up some trash and in a flash of fire turned it into a newspaper and put it in the bin. He resurrectd a plastic Sprite bottle and screwed the end of it into the bottom of a brown paper bag. He screwed a Coke bottle into the bottom of the bag too, and sat it on the park bench. He magically picked up more rubbish, making things move at his command. Eventually he made a ‘person’ (robot like) out of rubbish that began to move on it’s own accord. It stood up on it’s feet as Xavier taught it to walk. He then magically made some rubbish come out of the bin to make a head and the bin fell to it’s side and began to move. It had become a dog.

21

Hugo Valenzuela

Stage Illusions

Argentina

Sponsor – Ray Francas (Entidad Magica Argentina)

This act was a dream sequence that became real. The set was painted to resemble a lounge room complete with a fireplace. The scene began with Hugo reading a newspaper with headlines of UFO sightings. The performer fell asleep and we were aware of time passing through a lighting sequence. The performer ‘woke up’ and saw a red laser beaming though his window. Strange things started to happen when Hugo went to investigate. His newspaper floated, objects in his room were destroyed, his head came off and then reattached itself, so did his leg and he even floated in the air. He tried to deflect the UFO intruder’s laser with a mirror. It seemed to work, the red laser turned white. A round pop-out black blind appeared and the performer experimented with it, making Saturn disappear from a picture on his wall. Hugo brought the white light inside with his new black blind and the performer seemed to attain supernatural powers for himself. He restored the damaged objects in his room, then he floated again and made his head and hand vanish and reappear. Then he took the round black blind and pulled it over himself making his whole body slowly disappear as though he was vanishing into a black hole. There was a lighting change and the performer woke up and took his bows, but the red laser pierced through his window for real. The concept of the act was original, although the performer looked a little uncomfortable and awkward having to act and perform magic simultaneously, this act has great potential.

22

Arthur Trace

Manipulation

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Dale Hindman (Academy of Magical Arts)

‘Post Modern Art’. An original and very creative routine. A cloth covered a framed piece of artwork on an easel. Arthur entered, pulled off the cloth revealing a piece of modern art in white, black and grey tones. His movements were seamlessly choreographed with his cool jazz music. Arthur plucked a circle from the painting to do ball manipulation with amazing speed and dexterity. The white balls changed to green and he picked another ball from the painting that became orange. Another white ball was added to the mix, all the while manipulating the balls with great speed. A blue silk appeared and turned the white ball blue. Another white ball to red and he put all of the balls back into the painting to colour it up. He wiped the green ball with his hand and smeared green paint on the picture. Arthur dipped a brush into a paint tin and painted a short white line on his black suit which he peeled off. It became a card for manipulation with pure white cards, which then turned to red and blue. He painted a long white line on his jacket, peeled it off and made cards out of the strip for a card fan that turned into a coloured fan of cards. Arthur looked confident and smooth and his moves were clean. A card fountain appeared in front of the painting, and as the cards flew into the air a few of them became a part of the painting. He moved a couple of lines on the painting, took off his ‘prescription’ glasses and threw them on to the painting turning it into a self-portrait. An excellent routine, very engaging. One of my favourites.

Mikael received a well deserved standing ovation! I can’t get this act out of my head! The act was performed in a cartoon style very much like Disney’s ‘Bugs Bunny conducting an orchestra’ piece. The stage was set with a music stand with sheet music. Mikael entered in a tuxedo as “the world’s greatest singer” (mainly opera, but mixing it up for comedy value). We heard an orchestra playing, but the music did not behave the way it should have and so begins the comic battle between the music and Mikael. The music wouldn’t play when it should, the microphone on a stand wouldn’t point in his direction until he freshened his breath with a spray, then he opened his mouth and a female voice came out. He transformed the microphone stand into a machine gun complete with a target piece and opened fire on the misbehaving ‘music’. The microphone cover caused him to sing in a different voice, he changed it and sang differently again, and again. The silk hanky in his pocket was pulled out, but was attached to a string of coloured silks ending with his spotty red and white underpants being pulled off. The microphone became a brush, then a duster, then the microphone took on a life of it’s own and headed off stage with Mikael frantically trying to pull it back (great mime work). The act became more and more frenetic. He let the microphone go and it disappeared into the wings. Throughout the act Mikael’s red bow tie kept vanishing and reappearing. It kept appearing at odd moments without the audience knowing it had vanished from his collar. Once, his bow tie became a buzzing fly, landed on his stomach and crawled up his chest to sit neatly back where it should. His new microphone acted like a flower on his jacket and he could hear his own heartbeat, and panicked when it skipped a few beats. He turned the pages of his music, each time causing him to sing in different styles. Then, his shoe vanished and when he put it back on he danced like Michael Jackson with sparks flying off his feet as he moon-walked across the stage. He tore up the sheet music changing it into a paper aeroplane, tore another page in two when a woman’s voice was singing causing her voice to warp and stop. The music continued with the appropriate male voice and Mikael followed along with a bowtie manipulation routine (similar to card manipulation), ripped off his white shirt under his jacket to reveal a Superman costume (very appropriate at this stage of the act since he was performing the impossible as a ‘singer’). He took the rest of the sheet music, tore it in half and from both hands did a large sheet music ‘fountain’ as a big finish. Excellent work!

24

Juan Ordeix

Mental Magic

Argentina

Sponsor – Ray Francas (Entidad Magica Argentina)

Juan randomly chose a volunteer by throwing a stuffed toy out into the audience and then gave it to one of the jury members to keep. He asked for a three digit number, an animal and a country. He asked the jury members to name a value of money ($65 was chosen, then it was agreed it would be in the form of a $50, $10 and $5 bill). The last three digits of the serial number of the $50 bill were chosen by the jury, a card (7 of spades) was named, as was a date. An envelope on a stand in full view of the audience was opened by the volunteer. Inside that was another envelope, inside again were yellow envelopes. Inside the first envelope was the date, the second contained the named card, and the third contained the three bills and the $50 had the correct serial number. Juan gave away all of his props, but kept the money as a present to himself. An incredible feat.

(The only way to improve the ending would be a newspaper page with the predicted date on it instead of just a sheet with the date written on it).

25

Retonio & Co.

General Magic

Switzerland

Sponsor – Ralph Kundig (Magischer Ring Der Schweiz)

A big set on stage represented a ‘sleazy joint’ and featured a pimp-like bartender who spent almost the entire act behind the bar talking to puppets. The bartender conversed with an Axtel Lip puppet when ‘Marilyn Monroe’ appeared from a blank picture frame surrounded by red curtains. She danced about the stage and went back into the frame for a quick change into a playboy bunny outfit under the cover of two silver shower pyros from the tops of the frame. She did a dancing cane routine and asked for a drink from the bartender. He poured her a drink, levitating the glass and the drink turned to a red silk. A rose and a bracelet appeared. The lady left at some stage in the act while the bartender pulled a puppet rabbit in a suit out of a hat. The rabbit said he hated magicians and hated the jury! After the ‘berate the jury session’, a lot more hard to understand ventriloquism and no action followed. The part that had most of the audience wondering why the act wasn’t disqualified was when an animated talking skeleton walked on stage pushing a trolley full of drinks and stood there listening as the bartender tried to convince it to have sex with the randy rabbit. The audience suffered watching the bartender come out from behind the bar to a finale that transformed the little puppet bunny into an enormous white rabbit you’d only see in your nightmares, holding the bartender in what was described as ‘the rabbit’s revenge!’

26

Senko

General Magic

France

Sponsor – Ray Francas (Entidad Magica Argentina)

Senko began the act dressed in a cloak and produced a white silk scarf, then a white cane and a dove. The cane turned red and turned into a red light bulb. He pulled a scarf through his neck and produced two doves. From a red silk he produced a red candle, lit it, then it turned into a lit light bulb. He pulled out the light and caused it to float then shoot back to the bulb again. The red silk split to become two red silks. Then two blue silks produced two blue light bulbs (one of them alight). Senko produced a lamp for his lamp post and two more doves appeared. The doves were all placed on an elaborate Greek style column framed table. He produced another four white light bulbs, then another which turned into a dove. One dove turned into a lit light bulb, then all the doves turned into glowing light bulbs. A nice act.

27

Tatu

Manipulation

Finland

Sponsor – Robert Jagerhorn (Finnish Magic Circle)

There was only one kind of manipulation in this act. But, I’ll describe it for you anyway.

There was a blue and white spot light on a darkened stage with a ringing sound throughout the whole act that almost left me with tinnitus. The performer stood still and blank faced in the spotlight for most of the act… and naked, except for a white pair of tight underpants and white body paint. He slowly manipulated one ball for a very long time. It might have been considered magic if the moves were at all deceptive. Finally he started to multiply the ball, but this had the audience looking everywhere but where he wanted the audience to look. There are only so many places to hide a ball when you’re naked and itt was painfully obvious where his balls were throughout the entire act. Tatu finally twisted slowly to the floor, rolled on to his belly, onto his back and up to standing position again to display five balls in a final pose.

28

Rocco

Parlour Magic

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Dale Hindman (Academy of Magical Arts)

Rocco, in his unique style, did a version of his food production act and feasted on the results. He produced and munched on bread sticks, crumbling them in his hands and letting it all fall to the floor, He produced salt and salted the food for flavour, he transformed the bread sticks into pretzels, and bigger pretzels, and a bigger one still. He changed tack and took a silk tie to produce a rose from which he took the bud and put it on his jacket. He produced a white ball and turned it into a cane. Streamers were torn and rolled up into a ball that turned into a candle. He lit the candle and squashed it into a cigarette. Now he approached the microphone and spoke, but wandered away from it still talking as he explained how he can control water. He took a vase of water and poured the water into a bowl and drank from it while still chewing on something. He drank again, christened himself and then blessed the audience. A flower drooped and he placed the vase on his table, but missed at it dropped to the floor. (A trusty crew member rushed on stage to put it back on the table). Now he had two bowls of water and continued to drink from them. The bowls kept filling and he drank and drank and drank and drank. There was a fire in the bowl which turned to red and white confetti. He finished by transforming the bowl into confetti and streamers. (This was the first time Rocco has competed at FISM since winning 3rd Place in Micro Magic in 1994).

29

Reggie Simon

Manipulation

Sweden

Sponsor – Dag Lofalk (Svesk Magisk Cirkel)

Reggie was dressed in a red and white pin striped suit and cane. He played a cool character,the music was modern and his moves were smooth. He performed an excellent dancing cane routine having the cane dance around his body as he tipped his hat in a ‘Mr.Cool’ sort of way. He took his white silk and turned it into a cigarette. His cigarette box turned into a newspaper he used to hold up to cover his face when the sound of a police siren screamed by. He produced a fan of dollar bills from a small box on a stand next to him and performed a bill manipulation routine (and he still hadn’t removed his black gloves!) He produced another newspaper as he hid from the police siren again. He then produced coins for a manipulation routine, picking up a dropped coin with his shoe. He ended the act by running off stage as the police seemed to have caught up with him.

30

Brinum-X

General Magic

Latvia

Sponsor – Giovanni Pasqua (Circolo Amici Della Magia Di Torino)

Two performers, a lady and a man, did a bubble act in elaborate costumes. The man began smoking a pipe, blowing smoke into bubbles that kept popping. The lady moved about the stage obscuring the man’s actions, maybe they were preparing for something… or panicking. The man put on a glove and produced a smoke filled bubble which the lady caught and transformed into a white flower she put in her hair. Two acrylic balls were produced and turned into something silver. The lady sprayed the air all over the stage with a solution of some sort (it may have been used to keep the bubbles from bursting). Lots of spraying before the lady stood on a special area for making a bubble curtain around her, which broke. Again, the man tried for a bubble curtain and in a puff of smoke, the lady instantly changed her costume (but it wasn’t as instant as they had hoped and exposed the change). They both began to produce really large bubble ribbons across the stage. Some confetti concluded the act. There was hardly any magic in this act…and hardly any bubbles.

31

Yamagami Brothers

Stage Illusions

Japan

Sponsor – Junichiro Sejima (Society of Japanese Magicians)

These two young ten year old brothers graced the FISM stage again with their ever so cute smiles and dynamism. (We saw them in 2003 aged seven and they absolutely stole the show with their illusions). One dressed in a blue costume, the other in red and together they performed a levitation over a stylized chair on a small podium which they seemed to have some difficulty with. The ‘red’ brother uneasily floated to the ground from the podium then both performed an upbeat, synchronised dance sequence with cartwheels. Finally, they performed a sword box/sub trunk illusion in the shape of a small pyramid. The ‘blue’ brother locked the ‘red’ brother inside the pyramid, pushed five swords through the box, pulled them out, stood on the pyramid, held up a silver cloth and did an exchange with his brother. Unfortunately, the secret was exposed and the brothers did their best to cover it, then they marched off the stage together. The Yamagami Brothers have fabulous presentational skills.

32

Vidar Strat

Manipulation

Norway

Sponsor – Jarle Leirpoll (Magisk Cirkel Norge)

Vidar wore a black top hat and suit, produced a white cane and a red silk. He changed the cane to a white ball for a ball manipulation routine. He then performed a linking rings routine which was fairly fast paced, making many different patterns with the rings before making another three rings appear. He produced a card fan and performed a card routine, manipulating the deck and plucking cards out of the air. His moves were clean. Finally he produced a red silk and white cane and posed as he did when he began the act. Vidar held the pose nicely as the curtains slowly closed.

33

Fernando Arribas

Mental Magic

Spain

Sponsor – Vincente Rafaeles (As. Catalana De Mags Ill. Prof. Y Empr.)

Fernando performed his act in the style of visiting an old cinema. He handed out ten tickets to audience members and those with tickets joined him up on stage. The audience members were to randomly choose how the film would be played out and Fernando would then play his film prediction. The options were: 1. Place (I couldn’t understand where) 2. Travel options (train) 3. Wine (Prostos) 4. Menu number (No.13 Mixed turkey bagel) 5. Price (500 pesos) 6. Main course (Pepper rump steak) 7. (I missed it) 8. Dessert (No. 73 Chocolate Mousse) 9. Amount (3392) 10. Time (8:20). Fernando played his film and his predictions were indeed all played out on the film.

Alexandre skated on to the stage on a skate board to rap music. Dressed in street clothes he did an instant hat change, then another hat change before he produced a can of spray paint. He was about to paint on some transport boxes, but the spray can turned to a bottle of Coke. He took a towel out of a box on stage and produced a large Coke bottle and used his cap to change it into a can of Coke before pouring the contents into a glass. He performed the floating glass, did an instant costume change to a red and black striped shirt and produced a huge Coke bottle. Picking up a large striped cloth, Alexandre stood behind it and ‘stretched’ himself, moving his head from top to bottom of the cloth while his hands held the cloth at the top. He flicked up the cloth to show no-one was there, then produced another young man. The second youth got into an oversized fabric ‘back pack’ style bag and with a cloth, they did an instant change, subtrunk style but with the performer on the floor next to the bag instead of on top of it. Alexandre took his skate board and split it into two boards.

35

Brando Y Silvana

General Magic

Argentina

Sponsor – Franco Napoli (Entidad Magica Argentina)

Brando and Silvana began this act in period costume, with the lady dressed as a flower seller complete with a basket and man dressed as a street hustler, all costumes and props were in shades of grey. Brando performs a ‘street’ version on the cups and balls on his stand betting Silvana to find the ball. The balls were white (good contrast to the set). The lady kept losing the bets, so she stole a ball and several personal items from the man. He got it all back without her knowing at first, and also took her umbrella. She performed a floating rose effect and he decided to give her money for the flower, as well as giving back her umbrella he stole. She mimed being pulled by the wind with her umbrella, performing a self levitation. She had some trouble standing back upright before Brando threw some colorful confetti over her to do an instant costume change into a beautiful period style purple satin dress and colorful umbrella. He instantly changed into rich colorful clothing also, very bright well-to-do attire. Brando changed the cups and balls stand into a nice park bench before both sat and enjoyed their new wealthy life. A happy story. (We saw them first at FISM 2000 where they were booed for doing an act that appeared to be a copy of Junge Junge. They competed again at FISM 2003 with this act).

36

Erix

Manipulation

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

A jukebox onstage played 1950’s music. Erix danced around the stage, threw confetti to produce a milk shake. He produced a few coins and then a white ball for juggling, then did a ball manipulation routine. Clean moves. He finished with a ‘spider’ (soda and ice-cream). The jukebox played up, he changed music, took a black record and changed it to blue, then red. The red colour came off the record to become a red silk from which he produced three small records which all changed to a bigger record, which changed into a mirror. He took off his jacket, produced a card fan and did some card manipulation routine ending in confetti. He produced more cards and changed then into a milkshake. Erix took a cloth from behind the jukebox, held it up to instantly change back into his jacket.

This story of a man trying to woo a lady began with the music “This Business of Love” by Domino. The man was dressed in a pin-striped suit, the lady was dressed in a 1930’s style outfit, sitting on a chair, holding a cigarette held in a long black holder. The man produced a fire to light the cigarette but burned his hand. The fire turned into a glass. He produced a wine bottle and floated the glass as he poured the wine. He poured the drink into a newspaper, vanished the liquid, brought it back and poured it into the lady’s glass. His face was pushed into her breasts, he did a ‘long tongue’ gag, she pulled his tongue out but he retrieved and restored it. He performed the 20th Century Bra trick because he wanted to see her naked. He tried to woo her by dressing up a little, turned a red rose on his jacket to a pink silk he placed in his pocket, he produced a bunch of roses to give to her and took the petals from the roses and put them into a black scarf to produce more buds to put back on the stems. He produced a diamond ring, threw it in the air which ended up on her gloved finger. She took off her gloves and demanded money but he didn’t have any. He pulled his out his pockets to show them empty, but they turned to confetti and some money. A small snow storm from the ceiling of confetti and money fell to the floor as he self levitated (Superman style with one arm out in front). She fawned over him and stole the money as they walked off together.

David wore a black suit, red tie and white gloves that turned into a white ball as he took them off, which in turn changed into a white scarf. He produced a cane, put a knot in his scarf that was flicked off into a ball, then attached the ball to the end of the cane as a ferrule. David’s moves are very clean and elegant. He produced a red envelope with the Ace of Hearts inside. He took out the card, vanished it and it ended up back inside the envelope. He took it out and went on to card manipulation ending as the cards turned into confetti. He produced more cards and the card ended up back inside the envelope, more card fans appeared from which he reproduced the envelope. He removed two heart cards from inside the envelope which he changed to a red scarf and back to the envelope again. David produced a large card fan that shrank and vanished to confetti. He showed his hat with nothing in it, but confetti floated out. A very clean, elegant act.

39

Dion

Manipulation

Netherlands

Sponsor – Ronald Moray (Nederlands Magische Unie)

The music seemed to have been written for this act as Dion performed a neat and polished act. He took a white scarf and produced a ball, which changed into a dove. A piece of string was lit to produce a white scarf which was split in two and tied together. The knot popped off to become a bird. Very nice moves. The dove flew away and returned to Dion who made three birds. He produced fans of cards and manipulated them. He showed his hands empty then produced a green ball that turned into a green scarf, and from it he produced a green fan (not a card fan) which was used to produce a dove. Dion lifted a blue cloth from a stand to reveal a large white ball with which he performed a nice zombie routine. He turned the ball into a dove beautifully, took a shiny cloth, covered the whole stand and made all the doves vanish.

40

Latko

General Magic

Argentina

Sponsor – Ray Francas (Entidad Magica Argentina)

The act opened on a darkened stage. The sound of a motorbike racing, screeching and crashing was heard. Lights came up and we saw a biker stagger up with his motorbike exhaust in his hand angry at another driver (who we didn’t see) for causing him to crash. Latko’s bike was broken and his act was all about him magically repairing it. He produced fire in his hand, burned up a large ring and turned it into a can. Fire sticks turned to canes that acted as handle bars on his bike. He produced more fire that turned into mirrors. More fire sticks turned into the spokes of his wheel. He produced goggles and lights for his headlights. He threw a black cloth over a piece of machinery I’m not familiar with and did a zombie routine. From a Harley Davison cloth Latko produced a shield for the bike, pyros were set off to produce a helmet on his head, he got on his bike, started it up and went to blackout as it looked like the bike began to move. Very original thinking.

41

Sittah

Stage Illusions

Netherlands

Sponsor – Ronald Moray (Nederlands Magische Unie)

This act was introduced as a story of good and evil, where the action taking place was a battle to capture a magical glittering silver amulet, the source of power. Male dancers made an energetic entrance, performing acrobatics. The ‘evil’ man entered the scene to try and steal the amulet hanging in a large ‘pyramid’ frame on a stand. When he came too close, sirens sounded and the amulet rose to the top of the pyramid, a large cloth was draped over the illusion and whipped away to reveal Sittah in a tight silver costume inside the pyramid. A fight scene ensued where Sittah fought off the four males with combat moves. Sittah made two ladies appear from a fire cage and did a sexy dance with them until two young men came onto the scene and started fighting with her. She hypnotized one of them and had him placed in a small pyramid box (like a sword basket) and four fire sticks were inserted into the illusion which was then shown empty. A red flag was waved and he got back out of it. Some smoke filled the same illusion and the ‘evil’ man came out of it, too. He seduced her, but put her into a round frame that resembled a globe of the world with an arrow through it. It was covered and she vanished and reappeared across the stage in a tall triangular illusion. She got out and was persuaded to lie down on a spiker illusion. After being tied up and struggling fruitlessly to escape, blinds were pulled up and the fiery spikes were released. She had vanished and reappeared in the audience. She got her silver amulet back in the end. Very strong, energetic performance. (We last saw her compete at FISM in 1997 with Hans Klok when they received 2nd place in Illusions).

42

Nikolai Friedrich

Mental Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Nikolai, with music playing softly in the background and in a relaxed manner began his act by plucking rose petals from a rose in his hand saying “She loves me, she loves me not…” The judges preselected a volunteer and he asked her to write down the place of a rendevous in a city anywhere in the world, a place she has always wanted to visit, a place that everyone would know. She was asked to hand her written answer to someone next to her. She was then asked to imagine the colour of the dress she would wear and give her written answer to another person. She was asked for a two digit number. He did this by describing it to her with beautiful visuals, of rose petals falling into a pond and forming the numbers. The he read her mind asking her for confirmation. The dress was emerald in colour, the city was Casablanca and her hotel room key was 36. He asked for a photo of someone close to her and put it into an envelope, mixed it with other envelopes, then he found it. The act was rushed at the end because he ran out of time. He thought he was disqualified because the red light stopped blinking, the judges also thought he was disqualified, but apparently he was not. (Nikolai ranked 3rd Place in Mental Magic at FISM 2000 for his very original Mona Lisa puzzle act).

43

Bastrakov’s Magic

General Magic

Russian Federation

Sponsor – Vladamir Rudnev (Moskovskiy Klub Fukosnikov)

The performers (a man and a lady) wore traditional Russian costumes and performed this colourful act to Russian music. They produced lots of bagels and six guitars. Holding up a large silk, they both changed costumes not so instantly, produced two huge fabric Russian dolls and a huge guitar from the same cloth. They performed a very similar act in FISM 2003.

44

Sergei Bua

General Magic

Spain

Sponsor – Vincente Rafaeles (As. Catalana De Mags Ill. Prof. Y Empr.)

The act used projection on a large screen. There was a countdown on the screen, a flash and Sergi wlks throught the screen. Sergi interacted with the screen using magic. For example, he saw a glass on screen and reached into the screen to pull it out. He makes a dove appear, a cage is drawn on the screen, so he reaches in and puts the dove inside it. He pulled a yellow silk out of the screen, made two silks and produced two doves that he puts on the screen. He produces another silk, puts it on the screen. The dove ‘thinks’ (shown by a think bubble), a yellow feather is plucked from the dove’s thoughts, it’s changed to a silk and then to another bird. He produces a snowstorm. It became hard to see Sergi because he didn’t stand in the spotlight. Sergi produced a balloon, lit the string attached, it burns up and bursts the balloon and a dove appeared.. Sergi walks onto the screen, shrinks the screen (visual only) and shatters it. The act suffered as the workings of the screen was exposed at the start of the act. Sergi did the same act at FISM 2003 but his timing was a lot better this FISM, and so was his dove handling.

45

Kristine

General Magic

Norway

Sponsor – Jarle Leirpoll (Magisk Cirkel Norge)

A Zorro style act. Kristine was dressed in a nice black and red costume with a red mask that turned into red roses, which in turned turned to confetti of petals from which she produced a potted flower plant. She performed a floating butterfly effect above a red fan, produced silks in red, yellow and black, making linking rings and flowers appear. She spun one ring on top of another and spun a ring on her finger. She put on a cape and mask and did a card stab with a sword. She took her cape and mask off and used her cape to produce a large bunch of red flowers and large bunch of yellow flowers, then stylishly exited the stage. Kristine performed this act at FISM 2003, but has improved her moves.

46

Matthew Gore

General Magic

South Africa

Sponsor – Christine Tait (South African Magic Council)

The set was a hat shop. Matthew entered the stage with a white face in the style of a mime artist, waving a small flag. He tried on a hat and went into a silk production, starting with the red silk around his neck. He picked up the silks and produced a glass of orange juice. When he took off his hat the music stopped. When he tried on another hat, the music began again, but in a different style. He wore a bowler hat and produced a newspaper and a cane. He folded the newspaper and poured orange juice into it and it vanished. He performed the torn and restored newspaper, folded it up again and poured out the orange juice. With a new hat (a top hat) he had a problem with a fly, he caught it, produced a yellow ball for a ball manipulation routine, then juggled the balls which lit up. With another hat he showed empty, then from it a card fountain appears. He put on a sleeping cap, picked up a blanket and levitated as he snoozed. Finally, some silks became the South African flag. Very good miming techniques, the tricks were all executed cleanly and the act was polished.

47

Kyoko

General Magic

Japan

Sponsor – Maki Kitami (Japanese Professional Magicians Association)

Kyoko was back again (she competed at FISM 2003) but with an entirely different act. This time, her energy was maintained throughout the whole act with strong characterisation as she stylishly executed the magic with ease. She was a hair dresser in a dark uniform. From a hair magazine she produced a large clock, took a red clock hand and changed it into a mirror, then a silk, and from it another mirror. She produces a comb which ended up in her hair. She does a thimble routine with hair clips and produces a large red and a yellow comb. From a comb came a hairdryer. She began to mime as an ‘invisible’ person entered the salon and sat in a chair for a hair cut. Kyoko wrapped a salon cape around the invisible person and their hands appear. After showing the client the hair magazine, she cut their hair (real hair appeared for a little while). To conclude the act, Kyoko morphed into the client, all dressed up (a costume change) and hair done ready to go out for the evening as the hairdresser became invisible. Kyoko’s moves were very slick and strong. She also had fabulous dance moves. (At the last FISM she performed in black leather and a cowboy hat as she did magic with guns, bullets and handcuffs).

48

Andreas Axmann

Manipulation

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Andreas’ white hat and white silks seemed to make the magic happen in this act. He moved a tie behind a cloth which attached itself to Andreas’ shirt. He sat on a chair and produced a coin for coin manipulation. He took off his hat and tie, moving the hat down the front of his body instantly changed his dark shirt to a white shirt with a red tie. He made a painting of a cocktail and ingredients appear. From the painting he pulled off the tomato, produced fruit (orange, banana, apple and pineapple) and put them all in a champagne bucket. He made the glass in the painting fill with blue liquid, put a Kiwi fruit slice on the glass for decoration and made the slice spin of its’ own accord. Then he ran his hat up his body and changed the colour of his tie again. The full glass in the picture was magically emptied and refilled again. Andreas manipulated a large straw, changed its’ colour to yellow and pulled the cocktail drink off the painting for the finale.

49

Richard Forget

General Magic

Canada

Sponsor – Joan Caesar (Association Canadienne De Magiciens)

Richard showed a newspaper and produced a white ball which changed into a white wand, then vanished it. He reproduced them and went into a ball manipulation routine. He turned one ball into a silk and confetti and another into a silk, then reproduced the balls again and back into a silk. He lit a fire in his hands which produced eight balls in a display. He opened the newspaper with the headline of ‘War’. Lighting effects and smoke come from behind it, but he showed nothing was there. He made a paper bird of peace with flapping wings and levitated it with a blue silk, ‘zombie’ style. It flew under the silk, he took away the silk and it still flew in front of him. Richard turned it into a mini snowstorm showing two birds flying carrying the peace symbol. Richard performed at FISM 2003 with an entirely different act,

50

Anton & Landru

General Magic/Invention

Argentina

Sponsor – Rene Oscar Hernando (Centro Magico Platense)

A comedy act featuring an old lady at home watching TV. She changed channels and danced to the music coming from it, her hanky danced with her. The TV set broke down so she called for the repairman, but the phone line was cut. She donned a witches hat and gazed into her crystal ball to conjur him up. The repairman turned up and tried to fix the TV. The old lady was cheeky with the repairman but left him to work. The repairman had difficulties repairing her TV set, he went about trying to find the problem, but accidently broke the old lady’s crystal ball. There was a bit of slapstick humour as the remote vanished and reappeared, the TV vanished and ended up in his bag, he tried to plug in the TV, but the line ended up being the old lady’s washing line. He put on the witches hat and put the old lady in a trance when she entered the room, the crystal ball reappeared intact, the TV ended up back on the table, he pushed the old lady over and she convincingly levitated, he pulled up her skirts from the ground to show nothing was there. She got back up and everything was back to normal, she payed him and he went to leave, but she put on her witches hat, brought him back inside, took his money and took him into another room (off stage) patting his bottom. Uhumm.

The illusionists began their act by performing a version of the tube stretch on Bethy in a big wooden barrel, but the she gets twisted as well. Then a cage illusion with chains was brought out, but Bethy didn’t want to get in it, so they chained up a man. The chains acted like bars on a prison cell. The illusion was covered briefly, then the revelation showed the man inside the cage had swapped places with another man and a young girl who was helping out. The third illusion was a wooden trunk a man was sitting on, he pulled up a cloth to show big animated lips singing inside the otherwise empty trunk. The trunk was covered again and a cage was uncovered nearby showing the singing lips. The cage was covered, then revealed to produce one person, then two, then a third and fourth person.

52

The Magic of the Nightingale

Parlour Magic

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Richard Dooley (Society of American Magicians)

The performer was a lady in an elaborate opera costume who revealed she was heaven and hell, that it was the story of the phantom. She sang throughout her act while she did a small snowstorm using her fan, a floating ball effect where the ball was obviously stuck to her thumb, then a woeful zombie routine with a silver ball that ended up stuck to her hat. There was a pop and rose petals appeared, she turned a ball into some flowers then thanked Jeff McBride as her teacher, calling for him in the audience but he wasn’t there, and proceeded to do a final effect that didn’t work. The performer was unable to concentrate on singing and magic at the same time.

53

Mr Avesta

General Magic

Netherlands

Sponsor – Ronald Moray (Nederlands Magische Unie)

Mr Avesta entered the stage decorated to resemble a gym. He wore a loud suit, green beret, green shoes and danced to music, doing a cut and restored rope routine. He revealed a silver ball in his shoe and a smoke pot went off for no reason. Fifi the fake dog barks from her basket next to a barbell with 100kg black balls attached to each end. Mr Avesta couldn’t lift the weight so he stripped off his clothes in strobe lighting to reveal himself in underpants and a muscle costume. He drank an energy drink, flowers popping out of it. He stands on a winner’s block, took some silks and turned them into the Netherlands flag, pulled out gold and silver from his mouth as well as big gold medals he decorated himself with. He then went over to lift up the barbell. As he lifted the weight, the dog yapped again and one weight fell on the dog and squashed it. A vacuum from the barbell sucked up the squashed dog and it came out the other end. That weight fell off too, but mysteriously rose. The judges red lighted Mr.Avesta for his unbelievably ridiculously bad act and he was disqualified, but he was able to finish his performance because the curtains were so slow in closing. He managed to waste a few good confetti cannons. This was another insulting act to FISM.

A ‘youth’ in a beret and street clothes reminiscent of Oliver Twist did what can be described as a celebratory dance of magic. Pilou was so easy, so natural, so exciting and so happy as he displayed his incredible talents in dexterity and performance. He produced card fans to an apple, which turned into a red silk that produced an apple again, which he pockets. From the silk he produced a candle, as he lit it, there was a flash and it turned into an apple again which he pockets. After producing three apples, he juggled them in character. He produced a flash that produced a newspaper and confetti. He produced another apple from his hat, produced more cards for a card manipulation routine, then single card productions. He pulled out his shoe from his beret, another apple and more and more cards, card scaling, card fan productions, card juggling, catching a card in his mouth and hands to produce a card fan that changed into a newspaper and confetti again. He took an apple from his beret, then tipped up his beret causing many apples to fall out. He sat sprawled easily over a barrel, casually producing more and more cards and an apple, a red silk revealed a large card fan that he split into two. He got up and scaled more cards, produced his two shoes from his beret, then continued into large card productions, then a newspaper and confetti again, more large cards, huge cards from his beret, a card fan that he doubled into two card fans and confetti burst everywhere. An excellent act!!!

55

Hayashi

Parlour Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Hayashi was dressed as a Samurai who held up comical subtitles on large cards as he spoke Japanese. The subtitles became cheeky as they took on a life of their own. Hayashi gave up on the subtitles and decided to use a translating machine. The machine had an American accent that (deliberately) went out of synch to Hayashi’s mouth movements. Something went wrong with the machine, then Hayashi spoke perfect English while the machine spoke Japanese. After the initial introduction, Hayashi announced he was going to do the “World’s Coolest Card Trick”. He had a card signed by a volunteer and showed the signed card at the top, middle and bottom of the deck in a manipulation routine. He showed the whole deck to be in perfect linear order. Then goes over to his machine, the signed card popped out, he stabbed the card with his Samurai sword and gave it to the volunteer.

56

Robert and Emiel

Mental Magic

Netherlands

Sponsor – Ronald Moray (Nederlands Magische Unie)

This act was extremely clever and thoroughly disturbing. Emiel introduced his ‘brother’ Robert as a child trapped in a man’s body. Robert was born with ‘a gift’. He was dressed in a white shiny plastic looking outfit, fabric he had picked out for himself especially for this occasion. He was blind folded with a black cloth and proceeded to psychically ‘see’ objects the audience were holding up. Emiel coaxed him on. Robert could ‘see’ numbers, a person’s date of birth and even knew what day a person was born on many years ago. Emiel took off Robert’s blindfold so he could look into someone’s eyes, seeing the type of money they chose and stating the serial number. The act was performed to tinkering notes on a piano which helped evoke an eerie atmosphere and the disturbing feeling that comes from seeing such a convincing oddity in a mentally challenged human being. Excellent character work but not to everybody’s taste. They achieved their goal of a convincing performance.

A comedy act. Xavier played the part of a musician who plays a flute behind a music stand. The flute blows out some bubbles and Xavier plays with the bubble. He performs an acrylic ball manipulation that included some clever contact juggling. He vanished the ball which then came out of his mouth. He then produced two balls and juggled them. He throws a ball into the air and all the balls vanish. He produced a silk, then one ball came back so he could continue a multiplying ball routine. From his little case on stage came a lot of bubbles and Xavier takes from it a large bubble. The case closed slowly by itself and the music stopped. He sneezed and the sheet music closed by itself. A clever routine with a little magic and a lot of juggling.

58

Minoru Arai

General Magic

Republic of Korea

Sponsor – Eun-Sung Chung (Korean Magic Society)

Minoru begins the act wearing a neat suit and standing near a fireplace holding a large white flower. He plucked the petals and pulled out a white silk. The silk changed to a fan of cards, then Minoru did a card manipulation routine to classical music. Slow and clean productions. He then produced a large card fan and did a Three Card Monte routine where the three Kings became three Queens, then changed into the Two of Hearts. It was covered with a glittery cloth and it disappears. The cloth becomes the Queen with no picture, but behind the cloth Minora produced a real lady, the Queen.

59

Sergey Ferdzhulyan

Manipulation

Russian Federation

Sponsor – Vladamir Rudnev (Moskovskiy Klub Fukosnikov)

Sergey worked to jazz music in this act. He produced a ball and did a ball manipulation routine, then produced a card fan and went back and forth between cards, ball, cards, ball, cards, ball. His quick finger movements matched the pacy piano music. Sergey’s fingers were always constantly moving even when he finished his act, walking off stage.

Jerome produced a white light and transported it to a white screen to do shadowography with a twist. This was ‘advanced’ shadowography using an LCD screen or projector. He took bubbles from the screen and made them real to do a glass ball manipulation routine, then took the ball and put it back onto the screen. A shadow spider appeared and Jerome was able to pull the thread of the spider’s web up and down the screen. He plucked strings on the screen like a guitar. Musical notes appeared of the screen, he made a man with his hands who was playing the saxophone, a camel, a ship on waves, a frog in a swamp that caught flies, feathers fell and he caught one of them making it real, then draws a cloud with it. The shadow lamp turns off and the stage lamp turns on. Little magic, but very clever work.

61

Jan-Thomas Loewe

Mental Magic/Invention

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

A unique themed mental magic act. Jan-Thomas Loewe called himself a Mathematician. He said he predicted numbers the jury was going to select. They were to name six numbers, the seventh number the jury member changed from 33 to 43. A movie was played, the date of the movie being Saturday 26 Feb, 2006. The season was winter (unlike the summer the audience was experiencing at FISM, Stockholm 2006). All the numbers were correct, including the seventh number change from 33 to 43 as predicted. He even handed out photographs of the filming day to the jury for verification. A very clever performance.

62

Kenneth Chan

General Magic

Hong Kong, China

Sponsor – Albert Tam Wing Cheun (Magician Association of Hong Kong)

The act was set in a bar with no bartender. Kenneth began with a bottle that he turned into a red ball to do a multiplying ball and manipulation routine ending with eight balls. A red silk was used to produce a champagne bottle. He drank from a Martini glass and rang for the bartender to pour him another drink, but no-one comes to the counter so he pours himself a drink and helps himself to a cigar. He blows smoke and his drink turns to confetti, then he did a card fan production, then multiplying cigars, produced a card fan, card fountain, and single card productions. He did a diminishing card effect, produced glasses for his eyes, took the drinks menu and a blue silk to produce a large fan of cards. He then took a picture of a drink and changed it to a real drink and used a large cloth to produce a waitress.

A neat routine to the song ‘Sixteen Tons and What Do You Get’ where Karim produced bottles, did a thimble routine where the thimbles disintegrated into confetti. His red tie became animated, he tied a knot with it in his hands, it untied itself and very cleverly jumped back up to tie itself back around Karim’s collar. He produced a drink for refreshment, lit a candelabra, to tango music he did a paper flash to rose into nice rose productions. He then produced a card fan to confetti, cards to make a card fan, produced more bottles and more card fans. All clean productions.

64

Paulo Maderal

General Magic

Argentina

Sponsor – Ray Francas (Entidad Magica Argentina)

Paulo was dressed in what looked like a school blazer and stood next to a lamp post. He used glass and coins to start his act which were hard to see. He produced a glass, then coins and notes to put in the glass as if he was collecting money. He picked up a large coin with his foot and made it bigger, made a red ball vanish and reappear a number of times using a silk, then used a white ball for a short multiplying ball routine. He made a hat appear, a lit candle appear then went into a card production and card scaling with random flights. He ended by doing an obvious steal for a large fan of cards that turned into an accordion.

65

Jakub Kroulik

General Magic

Czech Republic

Sponsor – Frantisek Cacc (Cesky Magicky Svaz)

Jakub’s act was set in a producer’s casting room with an old movie style setting. He entered the stage moving in an eccentric way, knees out and bouncing around. He made a photo of an actress in a frame vanish and reappear and hung it up. He conjured a large fob watch and multiplies it. An actress entered his room and he put on some gloves. He tried to woo her and give her a flower, but she constantly rejected him even after giving her a present. She stomps out of the room, only to reenter to get her present. He performed multiplying cigarette boxes but his eccentric movements, cluttered set and small props made it hard to see what he’s doing. He continued with cigarette manipulation, produced lollies (candy) and coins at his finger tips. He produced money notes which interested the actress. She grabbed the money but it turned to plain paper. He threw more money in the air and stood in front of the lady so she could do an instant change of costume from a red dress to a red dress with money on it, they waved and left the stage. Jakub performed a completely different act at FISM 2003.

66

Mann O Mann

Stage Illusions

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

The set featured a street bench. A street cleaner walked past it with a load of cleaning equipment on a trolley. A the cleaner walked past the bench, another cleaner suddenly appeared sitting on the bench reading a newspaper, then had his head twisted around by the first cleaner who then took away the newspaper, so he gets revenge by taking the first cleaner’s head for an instant.. They put bottles in a ‘No Bottles’ box cleaned the rest of the set. One moved the bottle box and it fell apart, but there were no bottles in it. One cleaner put the other cleaner in the equipment box on the trolley and squashed the box, making it a smaller box. He puts a garbage bin through a hole in the squashed box to ceate a large hole so we can see the squashed cleaner wasn’t there. He put cleaning equipment through the box as well (like a sword box) such as a mop, broom and shovel. He took the cleaning equipment out of the box and the squashed cleaner appeared OK, but his work clothes were in tatters. The other does an instant change into casual clothes, a ‘Happy sign’ was held up to cover the park bench briefly to change it into a motor bike.

67

Rolf Reiner

General Magic

Spain

Sponsor – Paschoal Ammirati (???)

Rolf performed at FISM 2003, but his act was different. He wore a red tie that played up, sticking out the bottom of his vest, then it pops out of the top of his vest and caught itself on a black satin cloth from his bag, then Rolf performed a zombie routine. We slowly realisethat he’s done it with his tie. The tie had a cold (known from the sound track). Rolf did a ‘tango’ zombie routine. He put sunglasses on the tie and gave it a lollypop, it choked so Rolf gave him some alcohol, then it burped and went to sleep. He put the tie in a bag and closed it. The tie woke up and knocked on the inside of the bag. Rolf opened the bag and the tie sat up. He turned his back and the tie appeared on his back. This was the same act but a better performance than at the last FISM.

68

Cody Stone

Manipulation

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Cody entered the stage on a skateboard. A wrist band appeared on his arm, a screw driver appeared and a drink appeared on his skateboard. The wrist band changed colour and so did his drink. He did a thimble style routine with his wristband. He made a CD appear, then took off his skateboard wheels and produced a spanner to fix them. Sunglasses appeared. Cody did flip stick moves with the spanner and did ball moves with the wheels. A wheel turned into a silk which was use to make the wheels magically appear back on the axles of the skateboard.

69

Zhao Yuying

General Magic

China

Sponsor – Lin Jian (China Magic Art Society)

The first moves Zhao made in her colourful traditional costume was to display a (real) fan with her foot in an impressive arabesque. She produced four fans on top of each other, collapsed them and split the remaining fan into two fans. She produced streamers which turned into a fan, then two more. She threw the fans away, took a green silk and made another fan. After making more fans (lots of them), she covered her face with a couple of fans to do a mask changing routine. She finished the act with a silk fountain that produced foil flowers, did a bad steal to produce two large fans and three or four extra scary arms appeared sticking out of her back also holding fans.

70

Die Zauderer

General Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

The ‘Silk of Power’ returned for the second time!!! Two knights in shining armour entered the stage holding the ‘Silk of Power’ followed by a third knight stooped over aided by an old person’s ‘walker’. They entered playing the trumpet and drums. The old knight accidentally put a third instrument resembling a large stick (maybe his sword) through the top of the drum. From inside the drum, you may have guessed, a vacuum cleaner sucked up the ‘Silk of Power’. A funny piece of play with the knight’s visors occurred before their big, serious swords became musical instruments: a pipe, guitar and a microphone. The vacuum cleaner in the drum was pulled out with the ‘Silk of Power’ stuck in the end of it. It sucked the red silk down it’s ‘throat’, so the knights took it apart in the style of ‘nest of boxes’. One knight found a balloon inside the vacuum and blew it up, popped it and the ‘Silk of Power’ appeared. A bird flew past and plopped on the ‘Silk of Power’. They played the spoons on a knight’s helmet. The bird came back and was speared by a sword. They used detergent to wash the ‘Silk of Power’ and decided to wash their own clothes inside their armour as well. The silk shrank and as they wrang it out, it restored. They then split the ‘Silk of Power’ into three ‘Silks of Power’. The first two knights turned their silk the right way up to display crown emblems, the third turned their silk upright to display a McDonald’s emblem. It rained and the knights turned their ‘Silks of Power’ into umbrellas. They received a standing ovation. Die Zauderer competed in 1997, 2000, 2003 receiving 3rd, 2nd, and 3rd places prizes in Comedy respectively. This year the Comedy category has been removed (it will be back next year) and instead awards for ‘Comedic Presentation’ will be given out.

71

Paolo Giua

Manipulation

Italy

Sponsor – Domenico Dante (Club Magico Italiano)

Academy Awards themed act. Paolo, dressed in a tuxedo, did an academy award production, then a card fountain. Some cards in his hand became smaller and smaller until they flashed into confetti and another Academy Award. He performed a red and yellow ball manipulation routine, a cigarette production using a silk, then produced another Academy Award that blew out a smoke pot. Paolo then did magic with a smoking cigarette, transferred the smoke into a container, produced champagne, a silver shower, glittery confetti and a confetti canon to end with a large Academy Award.

A parody act about magicians. Two boxes on stage were part of an illusion. Dressed in ‘typical’ magician and assistant garb, the magician produced spring flowers. His cane was wrapped in newspaper, vanishing as he unrolled it. He is confused. His assistant acts overly happy and excited, looking like they’re made the act up on the spot. They put one box inside the other and produced another lady. Two audience members (part of their team) yell out and came to the front of the theatre, protesting that the magic was old and the magic props could be bought at the supermarket. They asked to see the illusion done from behind. So, the performers prepare the act again. A cleaner came on and tried to sweep up the mess as they prepared to do the illusion again. The same effect was seen from behind. The magician produced a feather duster instead of his cane this time, his assistant got in the box, but in the end the two protesting audience members were found inside the box and the assistant ended up in the audience.

The act began with three small tables on stage. The performer tried to mentally make something happen to things on the first two tables, but failed. Two pre selected volunteers took two watches from the judges. Mentalist asked for a torch and a ball. He performed an experiment of ‘energy exhaustion’. He transferred light from the torch to the ball while the volunteers were holding the items. He had to exchange a judge’s watch because the watch was too complicated. A volunteer changed the time on a watch and the mentalist changed the time on the other for his prediction.. He took a volunteer over to the third table to show the time was the same: 11:25.

74

Fujimoto

Manipulation

Japan

Sponsor – Maki Kitami (Japanese Professional Magicians Association)

Fujimoto, with red eyeglasses and orange hair, took off a white glove, threw it to the floor and it became a ball. He took a cigarette out of his mouth and put it in a silk to vanish and reappear. He produced a small drink from the silk, drank it and doused out the lit cigarette he put inside his mouth. He blew smoke rings and pulled a white band from one of them with which he did some magic. He blew a bubble with smoke in it, then did a card production with card fans. From another smoke bubble he produced a silk, and another, wound them up and they turned into a cane. He used a rose as a microphone and sang into it for a while. He performed a rose manipulation, then a ball manipulation routine, turned a ball into a silk, then produced four red balls on his fingers and proceeded to do a thimble manipulation with balls, then a coloured CD production and manipulation. He drew a radio that became real and donned a head set to listen to the radio.A fire started in the radio and fire tried to run up the wire (flash string) to his ears, but it broke. An explosion in his ear pieces happened regardless and blew half of his orange hair blew half off. Fujimoto competed with different acts in FISM 2000 and 2003. This time his technique was marginally better.

Sirens in the sound track started the act. Marc appeared on stage looking futuristic for a dove act. He took a CD which changed as he threw it into a bird. His bird flew off its’ perch and into the back curtains, but Marc was too concerned to do his act to notice. He produced sunglasses that transformed into a dove, poured liquid into a cocktail shaker and the contents transformed into another dove as he threw it into the air. He poured more liquid into the shaker which changed to yellow streamers, and from it another two doves. He threw a dove into the air transforming to streamers. Finally, Marc took out a huge gun and fired it. ASulphur Crested Cockatoo came out of it and flew into the audience to stay. The doves in the cage on stage transformed to become a lady and her overly excited dog which jumped about the stage. The animals were not very well trained and Marc attracted whistles from the audience protesting that Marc didn’t stop to look after his birds.

76

Duo Mira-Cool-X

General Magic

Switzerland

Sponsor – Ralph Kundig (Magischer Ring Der Schweiz)

Quite an entertaining and deliberately silly act. The magician in top hat and tails changed a cane to a red silk and calls for his assistant who didn’t come for a while. When she did, the assistant was a man in drag with great legs who wanted nothing better than to change the magician’s old classical music to modern hip music she could enjoy dancing to. The assistant grabbed the magician’s hat and pulled props out of it, gave it back to the magician who put it on, water splashing on his head. The magician left the stage to clean up, the assistant changed the music and turned up the volume. The magician returned, changed the music back, the assistant falls over the ‘sword’ stand, took a sword and scratched her back with it. She was given money as a bribe to perform, so she went to get into an origami box, slipping on the stairs. She tried to elegantly get into the box but her foot crashed right through the base of the illusion and she broke the side of the box. The magician accidentally pulled off her wig and her dress came off as he pushed her down into the box, folded up the box to make a small one, pushed swords through the illusion, went to display the illusion but two of the legs broke off, embarrassing the magician because it exposed a photo of a naked girl. He pulled out the swords, lifted the small box to the floor and reconstructed it, covered it with a black cloth and the assistant appeared behind it but wouldn’t get out until the magician gave back her dress. They bowed and went to leave the stage as one of the swords she was wielding broke and the hilt got stuck between the her legs in a revealing display.

77

Chad Findlay

General Magic

South Africa

Sponsor – Christine Tait (South African Magic Council)

The set was darkened to reveal a screen that projected images of South Africa. Beside it stood a large lamp stand, a lit candle, a table and a mirror. Chad entered the stage singing. The magic echoed the sentiments in the songs he sang. He pulled a scarf out of an empty bowler hat which he flung onto the screen. He produced another silk and passed it through the mirror, then did a floating lit candle zombie routine. He took the silk away from the candle, still floating. Then the candle vanished. He covered the table with a cloth and produced a bowl of blue water. Blue was echoed in the screen behind. He went over to the lamp shade and the light goes out, he took the globe and poured water from the globe into the bowl. He picked up a top hat and pulled streamers out of it, then produced a silk. The white scarf came into view on screen and he plucked it out of the screen. Unfortunately, some of Chad’s props failed to work.

78

Alex Ryazanov

General Magic

Russian Federation

Sponsor – Vladamir Rudnev (Moskovskiy Klub Fukosnikov)

Alex was dressed in shiny black tails with bright red trousers, lapels and hat. His assistant was dressed in yellow and black tails. Together they performed a light and happy routine. He produced two lard fans of cards and performed a strange card manipulation until he showed the cards were strung together. They did a colour changing cane routine, the cane changed into two silk. The lady accidentally knocked him in his private parts, a red ball appeared in his mouth. The lady changed a silk to flowers, the magician pulled off the lady’s shirt (her coat was still on). Alex poured a dink for himself and his nose turned red like a clown, then pulled the lady’s tuxedo off, but she ended up in a dress doing elegant tango moves. Alex’s black jacket turned into a glittery red jacket. He pulled a silk from the lady, but accidentally pulled off her dress, she ran off stage. She ran back in a little tails jacket, threw a cape over his face briefly to reveal him in a monkey mask, he carried her off.

79

Keiko Muto

Manipulation

Japan

Sponsor – Junichiro Sejima (Society of Japanese Magicians)

Keiko dressed in an elegant black and purple Kimono style outfit. To upbeat music she produced a fan, vanished it to produce a bell, then two silks and three (real) fans. The music changed as she performed a ball manipulation routine. The balls turned into earrings. She produced another bell, a wand with which she did flip stick moves, very clean and sharp. She produced mini fans, then a larger fan, colour changing fans, more fan productions, ending in a snowstorm and confetti canon, then produced an umbrella as confetti fell. Keiko has competed with this act at FISM 2000 and 2003.

80

Illusionista Pedro III

Stage Illusions

Spain

Sponsor – Francisco Duaso Val (Asociacion Magica Aragonesa)

This act began with a lady switching channels on the TV to the magic programme, showing the act was about to begin. The TV flickers and turns off, then the words “PedroIII” appeared on the screen. As this happened, PedroIII appeared from an illusion. He then built the next illusion in front of the audience. It was a frame with two sides to it with a very thin base. Pedro III sat on one side of the illusion as his assistants erected the panels around him. As his assistants constructed the other side of the illusion, Pedro III seemed to vanish from one side and appeared on the other before they finished covering him up. Then Pedro III was tied up and put into the TV set. A lady gets on top with a large cloth and they do sub trunk exchange with the clothed being whipped away from the middle by Pedro III. It looked very fast. At FISM 2003 these performers presented an act with a haunted mansion theme so this was quite different.

81

Marc & Alex

Stage Illusions

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

This was an energetic act with plenty of girl dancers and lasers. Marc and Alex appear from the same illusion to begin the show. Marc and Alex wasted no time as they launched into their next illusion. They performed the sub trunk with the Pendragons’ tear apart cloth, then immediately performed a fire cage illusion with another rip apart cloth revealing two girls dressed as leopards, who ended up attaching themselves to the illusionsists. Fire sticks were twirled as one illusionist graffitied a picture of a girl on a large piece of paper on one side of the stage, a glass box illusion was covered briefly on the other side of the stage to reveal the girl. A girl was forced into another box illusion shown empty at first, rods were poked through the box, then the screen was burnt to nothing revealing the girl had vanished. The same illusion was coveredbriefly with a cloth and she returned, but then another girl appeared from the same box, then two more girls (one inside the box and one on top of the box), then a very large cloth made that illusion vanish and in it’s place yet another two girls appeared. I guess it’s almost every man’s fantasy.

82

Gustavo Raley

General Magic

Argentina

Sponsor – Rene Oscar Hernando (Centro Magico Platense)

Gustavo began his act playing the ultimate dag with weird stylized movements to the music of ‘The Entertainer’.He did a double colour changing suit, a bad version of the torn and restored newspaper, floated an old music box then changed it behind a cloth to a ghetto blaster, changed his costume to a red glossy shirt behind the same cloth and also changed his face to look like a hip magician with spiky hair with blonde tips. He produced a coke can and a glass to drink it from. A silk was crushed into the glass and vanished, reappearing out of the same coke can. He immediately poured another drink from the same coke can. Very clever. He pulled cards off his card tie, took a 70’s vinyl record and changed it to a CD, playing easy music. Gustavo crushed a sheet of aluminum foil that changed into long running silver streamers. He bunched up the streamers and from it produced a microphone and a large mirror ball. The stage went dark, two torches were used to parody the 20th Century Fox sound track movie spot lights, then Gustavo did a shadow routine in front of a projector. He formed with his hands Woody Woodpecker (the cartoon character), the Pink Panther, Bart Simpson, ‘Thing’ form the Adam’s Family, produced a playing card, a chicken, a kitten and two people dancing. Lights went up, he picked up a large cloth and instantly changed into roller skates, picked up his ghetto blaster and his coke and skated off stage.

83

Nana Hitomi

General Magic

Japan

Sponsor – Junichiro Sejima (Society of Japanese Magicians)

Japanese set. Nana produced red silks and changed them to masks, then to an umbrella, then produced another mask and did a zombie routine with it.. She vanished the mask and made it appear in a picture frame. She took large paddles and did paddle moves (as in close-up paddles but much larger), using silks to help. She produced shuttlecocks and batted them with the paddles. She made pictures appear on the paddles, then multiplied the paddles and produced a really large paddle. She juggled with something pink, dropped it, changed it to streamers at the same time produced another umbrella. Nana did a slow instant change behind the umbrella, then produced more streamers and confetti. She performed a silk fountain, produced more long streamers, gathered and folded them to produce a cape. She picked up her paddles and did more paddle moves, produced more pink streamers and four large floral bouquets. A very colourful act although the moves were fiddly and not very deceptive. It was good to see her doing a different act from her past two FISM performances.

84

Simon Pierro

General Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Simon performed as a 1950’s kitchen hand (dressed in a blue/green washer’s outfit and white apron) who wished for a wealthier lifestyle to attract an ‘uptown girl’. He magically produced an uptown girl at the doors of the restaurant. She walked in to the song ‘Uptown Girl’. She passes right by him, he does ‘the lean’ to kiss her (but of course doesn’t). He tried to impress her by juggling some dishes and instantly cleaning the dirty dishes. He played the plates like a guitar to woo her. He changed a white plate to one with a red painted heart. She left, then he started to dream of a different life he could have. He changed something kitchen-like on the wash bench into a small Statue of Liberty. He did ‘Miser’s Dream’ with a clear cylinder, produced a model of an expensive car, threw up a checkered cloth for an instant costume change to a black suit (he had changed professions). He manipulated cards, changed a Time Magazine cover to show his photo on the cover, produced a cigar, produced fish from his fist and put them in water. Then everything he touched turned to gold. He had the Midas touch – the statue turned to gold, his vest, his wallet, a bag. Things started to go weird and there was thunder. Everything started to turn back to normal The girl walks back in the restaurant, he held up his checkered cloth and the girl changed from an uptown girl to the ‘girl next door’ and they live happily ever after. (He performed this act in FISM 2003 where he received 2nd Place in General Magic).

85

Nikolai Dmitriev

General Magic

Russian Federation

Sponsor – Vladamir Rudnev (Moskovskiy Klub Fukosnikov)

A picture on an easel and a music stand and sheet music were on stage as Nikolai entered in white tails, took a note off the sheet music and began a manipulation act with the black music notes. He multiplied them with a bit of fiddling and exposure. He picked up a stick and turned it into a rose by magically adding leaves and a flower. He produced a very long lit white candle and placed it on a stand. He produced silks and various objects to place on the picture, he made a frame for the picture and turned it upside down. He had made an outdoor scene, magically making a red ball rise representing the sun.. He took a ball from behind the painting and did a large multiplying ball routine, except some balls were so obviously smaller than others. He juggled some balls, rolled out a Stockholm FISM 2006 banner and stood behind it with the ball on top.

86

Florian Zimmer

Manipulation

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Florian presented a different approach to producing the usual items used in manipulation by using a white spray can.He sprayed white spray onto his hand, the spray forming a white ball that he was able to manipulate. He used a cloth to squash the ball to form a smear of paint on the material, so when he slapped the cloth with the smear onto his T-shirt, he transferred the paint to create his name. Florian sprayed more white balls into existence before he changed the white spray can to red, threw a white ball into the air, sprayed it and it turned into a red ball. He then sprayed more red balls into existence. Florian lights a real fire on the barrel that made up his set. He sprayed the fire to douse it out, simultaneously his spray can turned white. He sprayed a white card onto the barrel, peeled it off to do a card manipulation routine with white cards. He tossed a white card into the air and it turned green. He sprayed cards into his hand, sprayed the air and plucked cards from the air then sprayede fans of cards. He covers his eyes with a fan of cards to produce sunglasses on his face. More card manipulation, white turning to green, he wiped green cards across his glasses so they turned green, too. Florian did a green card manipulation as well as manipulation at the tips of his fingers. He sprayed a red can into existence, his glasses turned red. He heard a police siren, so he sprayed himself a green hat, picked upa board and sprayed the letters “BMX”, a flash pot exploded, a real BMX bike appeared and he rides off the stage. A clever idea using a spray can to produce items.

87

Dai Binchun

Manipulation

China

Sponsor – Lin Jian (China Magic Art Society)

Dai did an act reminiscent of Bin Lin. He began his act sitting on a chair, produced sunglasses, vanished a cane and produced card fans to music from “Riverdance”. He scaled cards, manipulated and produced cards at his finger tips, more card fans and single card productions, produced large card fans, then back to small card fans, flung a card to catch it, did a little dance while producing more cards and scaling them. Dai then went to his chair to produce a large pop up card pyramid, produced a cane and sat back on the chair in his original starting position.

88

Timo Marc

General Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Timo began his act in a blue suit, lit flash string that didn’t work but produced a paint brush regardless. He went over to a blue screen (rear projection) and ‘painted’ orange letters on the screen which fell off into his bag. He wrote “Hello” to the audience, then painted an orange spot which he plucked off the screen to become an orange ball. He slapped his trouser pocket with it and his pocket turned orange. He painted a wriggly line on the blue screen so he could off a rope to do some rope tricks. He produced a blue rope, painted an orange spot on the screen, slaps the rope to the screen and the orange spot attaches to the rope as a knot. He untied the rope and an orange section on the blue rope remained. Timo poured orange paint from a cup into his hand and an orange ball appeared and turned to confetti. He then played a mock game of soccer with a little figure on screen. As Timo turned away, the little figure went to follow him but bumped into the side of the screen and fell down. Timo held a cloth up to the screen and it ‘broke’ (a crack appeared across the screen with the little figure incapacitated). Timo then went behind the screen to do some shadow work with a few tricks then he pulled off his head and held it on top off the screen for all to see, his arms came off his body, then a flash pot exploded as Timo did an ‘instant’ costume change into an orange suit.

89

Eun-Gyeol Lee

Manipulation (re-categorised by the Jury into General Magic)

Korea

Sponsor – Richard Dooley (Society of American Magicians)

Many people, including myself, believed Eun Gyeol should have won the Grand Prix award. He performed this act at FISM 2003 and came equal 2nd in Manipulation. His exceptional ability and skill in magically producing, vanishing and manipulating objects, cleverly and seamlessly segueing from one trick to another and his incredible ease and confidence in being able to entertain an audience, all with a charming demeanor and beautiful smile made him stand out in the competition. Eun Gyrol produced a fan of cards that transformed into a dove, produced a ball that turned to a silk to produce a glass. A flash appeared in the glass that turned to a silk that produced a dove. He produced a candle and lit it but it turned to confetti. He produced another candle that transformed into a ball which disintegrated into a puff of smoke. Another ball turned into a candle, a flash then two candles, back to a ball to a silk then a dove. A fan of candles, then card manipulation and vaporised the cards to smoke. Card productions to silk to another dove, more card fans and card productions then card manipulation at his finger tips that he made looks so easy! He scaled cards, card to dove, kept a ‘feather’ from the dove, lit it to transform it to cards and did an upside down riffle shuffle. Eun Gyeol then produced a flash and confetti to produce two hats, one with a card fountain. He took his bird cage and lit it, when it sparked all over the cage it exploded to produce another two large bird cages with doves, a huge fan of cards, another two large bird cages with doves, then a third with a lot of streamers to finish the act. A true winner.

90

Magic Wave

General Magic

Netherlands

Sponsor – Ronald Moray (Nederlands Magische Unie)

Magic Wave performed a very similar act at FISM 2003 where a ‘surfer’ and a skateboarder have a ‘friendly’ duel. The act began to music from the ‘Beach Boys’. The surfer did an instant change into casual clothes. The skateboarder pointed his finger at the surf board on stage and magically broke it in two, then produced sunglasses and put headphones on to listen to his music. The surfer fired a flash and the head phones exploded. They both produced a never ending stream of sand from their empty hands (3 kg in total – 6.6 lbs of sand!) all the while transferring the pouring of the sand seamlessly and effortlessly between each other. The sand turned to a ‘snowstorm’. The skater spray painted a girl on large paper the surfer was holding, he draws a cigarette and the surfer had a cigarette materialize in his mouth. The skater tears up the paper and restores it. The surfer peels off the bird in the picture and it becomes a toy bird that flaps its’ wings. The skater produced a full scale surfboard from behind the paper. The surfer produced and multiplied bottles then they both juggled them around each other’s body. A clever act.

91

Kazuma

General Magic

Japan

Sponsor – Junichiro Sejima (Society of Japanese Magicians)

This act featured a projector to highlight Kazuma’s act. Kazuma did a (pink) ball manipulation to begin his act then produced white confetti. The balls instantly multiplied to eight balls between his fingers. His movements were very smooth and almost robot like. He did a green and pink ball production before he used the projector screen to form shadows, like producing a ball. His own shadow turns a negative of itself then multiplies himself into three, where one of his shadows answered a mobile phone. He opened an umbrella because it started to rain on screen and did an impressive back bend before he came back out from behind the screen to produce a CD to CD manipulation and production (all choreographed especially to the music) then the CDs vanished to confetti. He produced a silk then did more CD productions with befitting screen images to match. A voice was heard “Welcome to the next level”. His CD turned green and so did his shirt, he produced a card fan (to music that confused the senses), floated a glowing ball that changed to glowing confetti

92

Junge Junge & Der Romer

General Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Junge Junge (without Der Romer) won 1st place in General Magic at FISM 1997 for a completely different act. This time, they did very little magic and a lot of chapeaugraphy and projector screen work. To music (like Yello and the Beatles), they began twisting their felt hats with a Western theme, then Spanish, rap style, Chinese, a Star Wars Stormtrooper (or Darth Vader), Madonna, herding cows, accident victim, Nuns, babies and a Titanic scene. Then the three of them did the most incredible and impressive choreography and interaction with a screen projection I’ve ever seen. They multiplied themselves, so there were two of each performer, making six. Each performer had himself reflected of the screen behind and beside themselves (totally six ‘people’). They interacted with their doubles on screen, doing a kind of levitation where the middle section of one performer floated upwards, higher than his head and legs. They jumped on and off screen with the most amazing precision and perfect timing. The extremely clever finale had them, with their three doubles on screen, take their clothes off and swap them with each other, ending up in the same clothes they started with in the first place. They all threw their clothes back and forth to each other and their doubles, transferring them through the visuals on screen and back to real life. You have to see this act to believe it!

93

Malin Nilsson

General Magic

Sweden

Sponsor – Dag Lofalk (Svensk Magisk Cirkel)

Marlin dressed and acted like an Oliver Twist type character. She wore a black top hat and black dress with stockings and boots reminiscent of a street urchin. Her bushy blonde hair added to the affect. Malin is a strong performer and her moves were well rehearsed and choreographed. She began with a rings routine, some of the moves were very clever. She performed fabulous hat juggling and played with her wand, making it appear from it’s usual place in her right boot to her mouth. She produced a small mirror and a lipstick, although something went awry at this moment she recovered without a beat. She pulled out a rope tied like a rabbit from her hat (after she had proven her hat empty by juggling it) and pulled out scissors to do a good rope routine. Her moves were sharp, metered, deliberate and dramatic and performed to plucking notes on a piano. The rope ended back up like a rabbit. A very good performance.

94

Aaron Crow

Mental Magic

Belgium

Sponsor – Olivier Prestant (????)

Aaron performed a “genuinely terrifying” act at FISM 2000 and won the 2nd place award for Mental Magic. This time, he performed another crazy act in the Mental Magic category. It was a mental act, not a Mental act. Dressed in a futuristic cloak, Aaron wielded a green laser gun (or arrow). He then went into the audience for two volunteers (partners), brought them up on stage and acted as ‘cupid’. A target was set up on one side of the stage. He took off the lady’s (wedding) ring, sat her on a chair, placed the ring inside a green apple, balanced it on a cushion and placed the cushion on her head, kept in place by her partner. On the opposite side of the stage to the target, he picked up his large red arrow and stung it on his bow, stood on a spinning plate, prepared the arrow for firing and spun himself in circles, aiming for the ring in the apple. The laser pointed at many people in the audience as he spun around on his disc a few times before he finally let go of the arrow. There was a second or two delay before the apple fell off her head and the arrow landing in the target. Her ring was found attached to the arrow, Aaron took it off and performed as a minister at a wedding as he had the lady’s partner put the ring back on her finger, asking them to kiss.

95

Yasu Okai

Manipulation

Japan

Sponsor – Maki Kitami (Japanese Professional Magicians Association)

Yasu is a very skilled performer with a lovely smile and clear moves. He performed card manipulation, coin magic to a large coin, produced a card fan by ‘warping’ the coin over his hands, did a another multiplying card routine to finish.

Ben and Alex played a policeman and a driver with a traffic infringement. The scene opened to traffic noises and a policeman writing out a ticket for a parking fine. The driver stole the policeman’s infringement pad and the policeman punched him. The policeman took cover in a large metal box labeled ‘radioactive’ that was sitting on four red and white striped legs (like the water poles in Venice). The driver pulled out his gun and shot the box and bullet holes appeared. The box became a sword box, so the driver shoved speeding signposts through the holes, pyros exploded and the driver went to leave but he heard crying coming from the box and a white ‘surrender’ flag waiving from one of the holes. A letter was pushed through a hole tied up with ribbon. It turned out to be a speeding fine. The driver lit a stick of dynamite and stuck it through a hole, exploding inside the box. A weak whistle was heard from inside the box, the policeman found his way out of the box (after the sign posts were taken out), his uniform in tatteres and ran after the driver who was trying to escape.

97

Park Min Soo

Manipulation

Republic of Korea

Sponsor – Eun-Sung Chung (Korean Magic Society)

Park Min Soo started the act by throwing out streamers. He produced silver cards and performed fast moves with something shiny. Small shiny objects are very hard to see. The silver cards turned into a dove. His assistant (a man) stood behind Park Min Soo to give the impression that he had four arms doing card productions. The props were now white alongside both performers dress in white making everything hard to see. He produced doves (which were white), card fans, single cards, card scaling and money notes (but hard to tell). He climbed into a glass pyramid and severely misjudged his vanishing act. What the audience saw was Park Min Soon climbing into the illusion and then into the trapdoor in the base. Then nothing happened. After a while the curtains closed.

98

Manuel Muerte (Replacing Wave who was listed in the programme)

Manipulation

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Manuel performed a parody act of a Las Vegas performer, or a magician trying to be a Las Vegas performer but most of the audience misunderstood the aim of the act and felt it to be a ‘lost, vague-ass’ performance. A lady announces “Manuel Muerte”. She adjusts the tuning on the radio (that was receiving signals through coat hangers). He came on to do some (deliberately) bad tricks and announce “The End”. His hand then got caught in the microphone stand, then two fake hands were caught in the microphone stand. The lady did an instant costume change, Manuel pulled out a broom from his jacket and gave it to her to clean up. He did multiplying silks, thinking he was a great performer. During his act, the lady brought on table after table of props and for somewhere to put his used tricks. He shot a bird and many of the tables started to wheel away from him. He went gun crazy, scaring away his props. The humour fell flat.

99

Bravo Nakaya

General Magic

Japan

Sponsor – Maki Kitami (Japanese Professional Magicians Association)

Bravo came out in a blue tails coat with gold trim, white shirt, black pants and a Spiderman mask. After tossing a few throw streamers (webs?) he produced a silk which read ‘The End’. He made some food appear, took off his mask and held a small black screen in front of his chest and a hand came through his stomach. This was followed by several odd objects climaxing with a small stuffed white tiger. He took two battery operated dancing hula dolls which he placed on tables on either side of the stage and told us how amazing it was that they danced but didn’t fall off the tables. He announced he would perform the “Human Body Exchange” and tried to hypnotise his assistant, but fell asleep on the floor himself. She held a large silver hoop of fabric over the two of them, lifted the cloth then, when it was dropped, he was holding the cloth and she was sleeping on the floor. He then displayed a cage, not an ‘Illusion Cage, but a pet cage for a large dog. His assistant climbed inside and he covered it with a cloth. After a moment or two he pulled the cloth off the cage revealing a tiger… well, it was his assistant now wearing a tiger suit. This was pure Japanese comedy magic and the audience laughed a lot.

100

Huang Zheng

Manipulation

China

Sponsor – Lin Jian (China Magic Art Society)

The scene opened with a beautifully dressed Chinese lady standing next to a full-sized autumn tree. A leaf fell from the tree which she picked up and crushed to sand, then produced a yellow silk. She produced flowers, confetti and cards very elegantly, and did a series of card fan manipulations. She changed a plume into a paper bird which span when she blew on it. She produced some red cards and another yellow silk from which a large number of flowers appeared. This was followed by card scaling, silk fountains and more confetti. For the climax she took a flute and brought on winter. As she played it snow fell from the ceiling and the leaves all fell off the tree revealing bare branches in the shape of a heart.

101

George Marek

Stage Illusions

Czech Republic

Sponsor – Frantisek Cach (Czesky Magisky Svaz)

This act was set in a graveyard and began with George stumbling across a large crypt. Zombies seemed to emerge from the ground and they went into quite a long dance routine with him. The four female zombies opened the crypt on all four sides to show that it was empty, they threw a large white lycra sheet over it and gradually we saw hands and a face pressing against the lycra from within the box. George pulled the sheet away and there was nothing there. This was repeated several times and each time there was no-one in the box. Finally George was put into the box, it was covered with the sheet, and he vanished. There was quite a lot of dancing and movement for what was, essentially, one effect.

CLOSE UP COMPETITION

1

Juan Carlos Rodarte

Parlour Magic

Mexico

Sponsor – Jose Luis Mazoy Kuri (???)

Juan Carlos had a great presentation and based his act on the theme of imagination. He said that his favourite game when he was a child was imagining he was a pirate. He then went into a cups and balls routine explaining that the balls were "ghost of pirates" as he changed their colours, and went through a series of cups and balls moves including a very visual transposition where a ball ran across the table from cup to cup. Overall he had very good misdirection except for one final load which was a little awkward, but it was a nice touch to bring in music as he revealed his final loads. It would have been good to stop there but he whipped out a pirate flag (with attached spirit hand) and proceeded to produce a slightly clumsy pirate ship. Nice idea but it didn't quite succeed.

2

Kristian Nivala

Card Magic

Finland

Sponsor – Timo Kulmakko (???)

Kristian had to put up with a little distraction for the first 30 seconds of his act as we could hear someone else's radio mic through the system. What made this even more obvious was the fact that he was doing a silent act. It began with a nice four ace production (which almost looked like shell cards!) and then he produced the entire deck. He had the jury sign the four aces and, despite a slightly obvious sleeve of the case into the spread, he went through a series of very visual effects with each ace. The first ace instantly vanished and in it's place was a jumbo card, and the signed ace reappeared inside the empty case that was on the table. He repeated this with each ace and the effect became more and more impressive each time. It was a well structured display of skill, spoiled only by an over the top finale where decks, giant coins and notes appeared from cards. Some cleverly, some obviously. This flurry of confusion really took away from the crisp magic in the rest of his act.

3

Mr Dannyman

Micro Magic

Sweden

Sponsor – Dag Lofalk (Svensk Magisk Cirkel)

Mr Dannyman got a great laugh when he put his close up mat out and we saw it was a 'Welcome Mat'. Wearing a red suit, ruffled shirt and immaculately groomed, he immediately started speaking in rhyming patter. At first this was annoying, then it became very clever and funny, but after about six minutes it started to get annoying again. He produced the four aces, each ace being bigger than the one before. He had a change bag with candy in it which he gave to the jury (actually he gave it to the time-keeper so no extra points to be had there!) Most of the effects he did were comedy based on his patter. He had a very funny collection of wands hanging inside his jacket and, at the end, he produced two lit matches which he used to ignite a small sign on his table and create a mini fireworks display. This was a stronger performance than he did in FISM 2000 with a similar act.

4

Morgan Strebler

Mental Magic

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Roger Miller (International Brotherhood of Magicians)

Morgan began by borrowing coins from the audience for a PK routine. The coins were collected in a glass however his misdirection was not so good and when the coins were later shown to all be bent he didn't get quite the reaction he could have. One thing that struck me was the fact that he borrowed all of these coins, bent them, but then didn't return them to the spectator. He bent and broke a fork very cleanly, then had another fork examined and began to bend it's tines. Again, his misdirection wasn't that good and it was obvious it wasn’t the same fork. He did totally bend all of the tines though, and continue twisting the body of the fork until it was a very unusual shape indeed. In the end, rather than give the 'art' away, he quoted a line from 'The Matrix' and proceeded to snap the fork into six pieces accompanied by music. A nice presentation.

5

Rafael Tubino

Card Magic

Brazil

Sponsor – Paschoal Ammirati (Associaciao Portugesa De Illusionismo)

Rafael began by changing any four selected cards into the four aces. He seemed very personable and cut the four aces into the pack, shuffled it, and they reappeared face up in the centre of the spread. Unfortunately they were joined by one face up card that didn't look like it was supposed to be in the act. He put the aces aside and had a card chosen which then appeared between the aces. He repeated this effect but with the card signed. This was followed by a moment where the entire hand holding the deck disappeared into his jacket, and the deck was then shown to have changed colour. All the cards on the table, including the aces and the signed card, had also turned red.

6

Saturo

Micro Magic

Japan

Sponsor – Maki Kitami (Japanese Professional Magicians Association)

Satoru was an energetic and naturally funny guy. He asked us about magic "Do you love it?" It was obvious that he did. He introduced us to his wallet which he said was his best friend, and had a card chosen. A bill from his wallet was then shown and it had a cartoon bubble on it with the name of the chosen card. He then had a toothpick chosen and showed that he had predicted which toothpick would be chosen. Suddenly, all the rest of the toothpicks were now coloured and the chosen toothpick was the only brown one. Finally he spread cards on the floor and had three people stamp on them to select cards. He revealed the first card was written on the soles of his shoes, the second card was on his socks, and the third card was written on the soles of his feet. As a bonus, he opened an umbrella which also had the chosen card on it. Very funny and quite clever.

Card Magic

Sponsor – Crovara Christophe (Magic Club of Lausanne)

Pierric had three inventions. His first was sensational. He had a tray with three apples on it, and a second tray marked 'pears'. He took each apple, one by one, and with no cover at all changed them into pears. It looked like real magic. His second invention seemed to be a piece of cardboard with which he was able to make a bill appear from a drawing of a magic lamp. Finally he did a single cup routine with a ball which turned to blue sand, then a giant blue ball that turned to sand, and finally he crushed the cup into sand too (which he presented in his act at the last FISM). He also did one more effect which didn't seem to be much of an invention at all. He tried to produce a rabbit from some silks but got a guinea pig instead. He then added a false set of ears to make it look like a rabbit.

9

Lodewijk De Widt

Card Magic

Netherlands

Sponsor – Ronald Moray (Nederlandse Magische Unie)

Lodewijk entered to music carrying a clipboard with paper on it and he drew a box. He then pushed the box from the centre of the sheet and it became a blank card case leaving a hole in the paper where it was. He opened the case and took out an entirely blank deck. He then printed four queens, front and back, and put them in his pocket. He printed the case, and the cards inside it as well. He had four cards chosen and torn into four pieces by volunteers. These pieces were put into a fishbowl and he then took four pieces out and presented his own version of a mismatched 'Reformation'. He fused four different card corners together, including one that was face down, and handed it out as a souvenir to the judges. It was a very nice effect, if a bit angly and his whole set was a little slow moving, but a great improvement from his act in FISM 2003.

10

Stuart Lightbody

Micro Magic

South Africa

Sponsor – Christine Tait (South African Magic Council)

This young man had real personality, polish and presentation. He entered wearing a bowling hat and offered his volunteer a cup of tea from the pot sitting on the close-up table. He vanished the tea cup as coins appeared and he went into the first matrix of the week. One coin was initialed and it vanished and reappeared inside a sugar packet. He had a card chosen and signed and it reappeared in his hat while the rest of the deck changed colour. He performed card to mouth and then discovered the tea in the pot had vanished leaving only a flower which he presented to his volunteer.

11

Martin Kaeppel

Mental Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Martin began by lighting a candle and inhaling the smoke from the match he used. He then held his hand over the flame for an uncomfortably long time as he spoke about what he was going to do. He brought out a big nail wrapped in a blood covered cloth and chose a spectator to play a "very, very funny game." He put the nail under one of four cups and as he explained the game in a very evil yet seductive character smoke pour out from his pants legs as he rested his feet on the table. He had his female volunteer slam her own hand down on any one of the cups. He assisted her for the first cups but once it was down to only two he left her on her own to choose the right cup. She did and it got a very strong reaction from the crowd. Unfortunately, from my angle, the method was exposed but still the theatricality of the piece was played very well indeed.

12

Kif

Card Magic

China

Sponsor – Richard Dooley (Society of American Magicians)

Kif was a very well dressed young man who began by showing a photograph of his master, the one who taught him how to gamble. He borrowed a bill and had the corner torn from it, then he changed it into a different bill (no corner missing) which he kept. He was speaking very fast so it was a little hard to follow but he produced some good hands for poker, then had a card chosen and signed (a king) and then changed the kings to aces and found the aces in his pockets. Four volunteers shuffled a quarter of the deck each. He then took the cards back and a volunteer named a four of a kind. He dealt out five hands of poker and they got their four of a kind and he got a royal flush. He then dealt all of the hearts and the signed king was found in the card case. Finally the spectator’s bill, with corner missing, was discovered in the frame with the photo of his master.

Mathieu presented one card effect. A very strong one too, that he was selling at his stand in the dealers room. He had a completely blank deck and tossed the card case to an audience member who he asked to name any card. They chose the nine of diamonds. He spread the deck and three cards were face up. These cards had the words printed on them 'Your', 'Card', 'Is The'. He then spread the deck and written on the face of the spread was 'Nine of Diamonds'.

14

Gianfranco Preverino

Cards

Italy

Sponsor – Vanni Bossi (Club Arte Magica-Milano)

First he showed a deck of blank cards and printed them. Next he showed the backs were red as was the case. He had Boris Wild choose a card (6H) and then found the aces while doing 'Rollover Aces' blindfolded. He then produced four royal flushes and separated the reds and blacks. Obie O'Brien named the 7H and Giancarlo found it quickly by cutting. He repeated the effect as Obie named the 4C. Unfortunately his deck switch was not as deceptive as he may have hoped for, however he found the card and separated the reds and blacks again. Then, when he spread the deck face down, Boris's card, the 6H, was written on the back of every card.

15

Hoperman

Micro Magic

Japan

Sponsor – Maki Kitami (Japanese Professional Magicians Association)

Hoperman performed to music with a table set up like an office desk. His sign saying he was at a meeting changed to say 'On Vacation' and he performed a seated cups and balls routine with two cups and some nuts. Water appeared from the cup, and then a little coconut tree as well. He was recreating the picture on his vacation sign right there on his desk. He produced mini bushes, a tiny life buoy, and a mini deck chair. He pulled a coconut from a drawing, cracked it open and his wand became a straw. The addition of a tiny umbrella made it a tropical cocktail. He changed his glasses into sunglasses and held up a world map with a spirit hand attached (at one point he had three hands!) to do a costume change behind it. Nice idea, a lot of fumbles though especially with the costume change at the end.

16

Inaki Zabaletta

Card Magic

Spain

Sponsor – Rene Oscar Hernando (Centro Magico Platense)

Inaki shuffled the cards, then took the cards out of the case. He did a rather obvious add-on as three cards were selected and he found the aces. The aces were signed and he went through an elaborate stacking procedure before dealing poker hands with the signed aces going to him. He put the aces back in the deck and dealt them to himself again. The volunteers choose a four of a kind (queens) plus an odd card (4S), they chose the number of players (3) and the winning hand (player 2). He dealt the cards just as requested. (Some of the effects were similar to those in his FISM 2003 performance which won him equal 2nd place in Card Magic with Gregory Wilson).

17

Tobias Heinemann

Parlour

Switzerland

Sponsor – Ralph Kundig (Magischer Ring Der Schweiz)

Tobias presented a very different act which began by showing a clip from his favourite horror movie 'Psycho'. He had three cards chosen which were to be his "victims". He spread the deck face down on a table and found all three cards by doing a card stab with the third card being found after the cards were covered by a sheet of newspaper. (Unfortunately, when he performed this routine at the last FISM, he failed to find the third card.) An entertaining presentation by a very likeable performer.

18

Ivan Amoedi

Micro Magic

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Dale Hindman (Academy of Magical Arts)

Ivan began entering to the wrong music. He handled it well by saying "Thanks, I'll use it next time!" to the sound operator. Once that was sorted out he began his pool themed act by producing a pool cue from a flat Crackerjacks box. He did a series of billiard ball manipulations and had fun with a magic 8 ball. He used the pool cue tips as thimbles and did a very nice sequence of vanishes and reproductions integrating the pool cue, chalk and a purse. He produced three rubber balls from the purse, then three pool balls and as a climax flipped his close up pad to make it a mini pool table which was then lifted up to reveal a giant pool ball. A professional performance that was well themed and quite entertaining.

Woody began with a great line. "Sorry about my bad english, I learnt it from a Lennart Green video." He had a whole pack of Jokers with red and blue backs. He shuffled them under the pretense that he would memorise the order of the backs. Oddly enough, the sequence seemed to be red, blue, red, blue, red, blue etc... He apologised and shuffled the cards again. Once more they were in sequence. He repeated this increasing the difficulty each time and each time it became more amazing. As he dealt the cards they could change from one red one blue, to two red two blue, or three red three blue at will! As a finale he shuffled the cards and just as we were expecting another alternating sequence he dealt the cards and each back was now a completely different colour! An amazing display of skill with a very entertaining presentation.

20

Chase Curtis

Micro Magic/Inventions

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Dale Hindman (Academy of Magical Arts)

This act involved not just a special table, but a special booth behind which the performer sat. He began entering to music (the same music Ivan Amoedi got unexpectedly) carrying a torch. He vanished the batteries and the reappeared in the torch but his sleeving was a little rough. He moved into the booth and performed multiplying batteries at his fingertips, he had four batteries and four little globes and as he moved the batteries near the globes they lit up. He did a matrix with lit globes (which was his invention) and dropped the four globes into a zip rip bag to change them into a big globe. He disassembled three torches which became cups and balls. Very nice idea, but the routine he then performed with them was very standard, the originality of the torches to cups demanded a more original routine. His final loads involved very obvious cup switches. He brought out two big Dolphin torches and placed a 6v battery in one which vanished with a thud and reappeared in the other torch. Finally, he did a zombie 6V battery which climaxed with a car battery leaping up from behind his desk into his hands. Chase appears to be a very personable and competent performer but he deserves better material than this.

Helder had a very bright costume and began with nothing more than his “mystery card” (a folded card resting under a glass) and his “mystery bag” (which contained an ‘Invisible Deck’). He performed a variation of the classic effect where the named card was shown to be face down but the rest of the deck was entirely blank. He had someone name a card (2D) and he found it. Well, it was completely blank but he told us it was the 2D and it signed by a spectator. He located all of the other 2s in the deck (also blank) and had the spectator sign those also. From there he went into a version of ‘Travellers’ as the four signed cards vanished from the deck and appeared in his pockets. He repeated the effect but only three signed cards went to his pockets, the fourth turned out to be the folded card under the glass. The rest of the deck then appeared to have printed itself and finally the folded and signed card was shown to now be the real 2D with the spectator’s signature on it’s face! This was one of the most talked about tricks of the convention.

22

Radini

Inventions

Norway

Sponsor – Jarle Leirpoll (Magiske Cirkel Norge)

After Helder’s effect, Radini presented essentially the same effect with a very different method. He had a spectator sign a card and he placed it into a clear plastic envelope tinted red. We could see the signature on the face of the card through the red plastic. Then he had the spectator choose a card (7D). Next he slowly pulled the card out of the envelope and it seemed to visually become the 7D with the signature on it. The method was a little obvious and the audience didn’t seem that impressed.

23

Stonkel

Card Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

This was a very funny act where the performer was continually interrupted by a noisy audience member. He began with a coin and the heckler yelled out that it was the card competition not coins, so he changed it into a deck of cards. He asked anyone to name a card, the guy yelled out “Jack of Hearts”, he asked for any number and he called “Six”. The performer counted down six cards and sure, enough there was the Jack of Hearts. The stooge kept challenging the performer to make the effect more difficult and he ended up standing on one leg on a chair facing the wall producing a glass of beer and a specific brand of cigarettes. A real volunteer chose and signed a card and when it was returned to the cards the deck had become a solid block of plastic. The signed card turned blank and reappeared in the card case. Then the stooge joined him on stage and did some very funny interaction with the volunteer and a big perspex box. It may not sound funny, but it was hilarious, and the finale involved the signed card appearing in an envelope held by Boris Wild. This was a very different act to the Stonkel we saw on stage at FISM 2003, were they even the same people?

24

Timothy Trust & Julie

Mental Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Timothy Trust, dressed in an outrageous purple suit and cartoonish top hat, began by introducing himself as a “Psychic Policeman” and his partner Julie as a “Psychic Shoplifter”. This reference to the earlier stage act of Eduardo Kozuch got a good laugh. He had a dry way of delivering some great lines including, referring to Julie as she had a blindfold examined by the audience, “She is one of those women who by her slow way of walking has made fast professional progress.” From there he went into an incredibly fast two-person telepathy act where the blindfolded Julie described all manner of objects handed to Timothy in the audience. They were very entertaining but had to end their act very quickly when the yellow light came on. Their last effect, naming the birthdates of four people, was a little lost as a result.

The close-up table was set as a restaurant with two seated volunteers and David entered as a waiter and began by using a huge napkin to produce a tiny coin. As music played he produced two wine glasses and transformed coins into cutlery. There was so much going on during David’s act that it was hard to keep up. He produced a bottle of wine and had a great running gag with a tape measure that kept reappearing so he could measure the distance between four coins that appeared on the close up mat. David had a card chosen and signed and it reappeared inside the pepper grinder on the table. In a flurry of a finale he stole the wine bottle from the table under the spectator’s nose and then produced both of his shoes and a spirit hand. David’s personality was strong and the act very entertaining.

26

Tricky Niki

Card Magic

Austria

Sponsor – Johann Kellner (Magischer Ring Austria)

Nicki entered carrying a FISM bag and did a gag about finally getting a ticket into the close-up room which got a good reaction. He also played to the people watching via video in the other room which went over very well. He had a card named (9H) and changed a 5S into that card. He set out a prediction and had two cards randomly chosen. Those cards were a 7 and a 3 and his prediction was 10, the remaining cards in the deck were blank. A card was signed and shuffled into the blank deck and, after a series of fancy flourishes, it vanished from the pack. He produced a glass from his jacket and brought out a six-pack of Red Bull and gave four cans to the jury. A spectator was asked to choose one of the remaining cans and examine it thoroughly. Nicki then opened the can, poured out the contents into the glass and shook the can. We heard something inside. He broke the can open and inside was the signed card. Very impressive! (Though I did miss the backflip he did in his close up act at FISM 2003).

27

Kevin Gallagher

Micro Magic

UK

Sponsor – Roger Miller (International Brotherhood of Magicians)

Kevin began by performing a matrix with tiny cards but then decided it might be hard to see so he used large coins and did the matrix with the cards under the coins. Then he did it a third time with large cards and the coins moving and concluded by producing giant coins. Next he performed the three shell game. He decided it might be hard to see so he did it again with three big peas and had the normal size shell under them. He then performed this a third time with giant shells and the big pea finishing with a huge shotglass for the finale. He made a small technical mistake when a pea appeared under the wrong shell but he covered it well and he did appear a little nervous but it was a well-constructed and presented routine.

28

Alexander Popov

Card Magic

Russian Federation

Sponsor – Vladamir Rudnev (Moskovskiy Klub Fukosnikov)

Alexander was a large bearded man with short fingers and incredible skill. He spoke in a sort of rambling mumble that was strangely fascinating as he went through a series of the most amazing cuts, shuffles and flourishes while locating the spectator’s chosen card. He performed very matter of factly, as though it was just another day at work, and the little whistle he did that seemed to make the chosen card pop up got a great reactionevery time he did it. It really became his trade mark. He finished by attempting to build a card castle in his hand. The audience was really behind him as he tried to construct it but, unfortunately, after three almost successful attempts he had to give up. The audience loved him.

29

Brad Bradley

Micro Magic

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Roger Miller (International Brotherhood of Magicians)

Brad sat down at the close-up table and did a very basic cup and ball routine in rhyming patter. He also performed a paddle routine. He then introduced a double-ended cup he referred to as a “cup cup” and did some incredibly simple moves all the while speaking to us as though we were three-year old children. Why Roger Miller thought Brad’s act was up to FISM standard is beyond me. The audience was laughing at him, not with him, and in the end a small group of people gave him a standing ovation.

30

Harry Lucas

Mental Magic

Austria

Sponsor – Johann Kellner (Magischer Ring Austria)

Harry began by having the entire audience stand up and swear an oath that they were not stooges. He then handed a prediction and a stop watch to an audience member. Two volunteers were brought up and given a pad and pen each and both were asked to visualize an animal and then draw it. It was a little dull as there was nothing happening while they were drawing but in the end they had both drawn elephants. For the next experiment he asked the spectators to stand back to back and for one to make some simple gesture, then the other to try to duplicate that gesture. After two or three unsuccessful attempts he abandoned that test. Finally he had the audience member with the watch to stoop the time. It was 7 minutes and 5 seconds. His prediction was opened and matched the time exactly.

31

Mario Bove

Card Magic

Italy

Sponsor – Domenico Dante (Club Magico Italiano)

Speaking English with a thick Italian accent Mario had a gambling theme and offered to show “how the gamblers do it”. He started by cutting to the kings then gave a demonstration of ‘The Invisible Palm’ and changed the kings to aces. He dealt four poker hands with him getting the face up aces while the other players got four fives, four queens and four kings. He put the aces into different parts of the deck and then cut to them, then discovered all of the spades one by one. Finally the whole deck was shown to be in order. Mario was a very gracious performer thanking everyone for taking the time to watch his act.

32

Will Houston

Micro Magic

UK

Sponsor – Alan Shaxon (The Magic Circle)

Will began with a very proficient coin routine to music, standing up with three coins, no sleeves and finishing with two jumbo coins. He did a card routine to music where he cut to the aces, did a deck vanish, card matrix with the appearance of four coins under the cards which went into coin matrix and many variations. He transformed the coins into Chinese coins and did Henry Evans effect where four Chinese coins appear from a card. He changed coins into a lighter and then produced a giant lighter from a flash (which didn’t work) and then produced an even bigger lighter (which did work). His technique was crisp, clean and effortless though I would have liked to have seen more of his personality.

An extremely unusual act themed around fish. The stage area was covered in tables with various bowls of water on them. With thunder and rain sound effects playing, Guilhelm lit flash string that changed into a card case, he took a deck of blank cards from the case, pictures of fish appeared on all of the cards, then he poured a live fish out of the card case. Fish number two was produced from a rolled up ‘fish card’ and fish number three came from his bare hands. Guilhelm took more flash string, lit it, and it became a lemon. He cut the lemon open, squeezed juice all over the floor, then pour a fish from the lemon. More flsh string was lit and a glass appeared. He produced another fish from a fish sticker, and then made the production of a fish-filled aquarium from a silk. Finally he blew out a candle and his shoe caught fire. He took off his shoe and poured out another fish. Quite an unusual way to populate an aquarium.

34

Rocco

Micro Magic

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Dale Hindman (Academy of Magical Arts)

Rocco won 3rd Place in Close Up in 1994, so it was interesting to see what he’d come up with now. Performing to music while chatting away he began by producing a razor for a man with a thick beard. Next he called me up and asked me to kiss a piece of flashpaper. I did and he changed it into lipstick which he gave to me. He then produced a baffling array of items and proceeded to hand them out to various audience members: a lime, an egg, silks, wineglasses, popcorn, glitter, lime juice, cigarettes, pipes, grapes, confetti, ice, corn, ice-creams, and water. At the end of the act there was so much on the floor it looked like a clown had exploded! There’s something intriguing about Rocco’s act, even if you know how it works, it just draws you in and fascinates you.

35

Felix

Card Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Felix also chose me to be his spectator. He began with a poker theme and produced the four queens. He asked me “What do you think is the most common question people ask a magician?” He must have expected me to answer “How is it done?” but the first thing that came into my head was “Can you make my wife disappear?” He looked a little flustered and said “No family problems, please!” and I’m sure I saw Tim reaching for the red button. (Just joking, of course!) As the audience was laughing and Felix was about to go into his routine when he fumbled and dropped the deck on the floor. Thinking quickly he said “Time for a deck switch” and pulled out a spare deck. I’m sure he improvised the rest of the routine but he did very well under the circumstances. He found the four queens again and caused the red and black queens to switch places. Next he did a signed card to card case and then found all of the cards in one suit one by one and ended with the entire deck in order.

36

Rey Ben

Micro Magic/Inventions

Argentina

Sponsor – Rudyard Magaldi (Circolo Magico Argentino)

Rey Ben began by demonstrating and explaining his first invention, a cigarette dropper that fed one cigarette at a time down your sleeve then doubled as a cigarette case for a final production. Rey then chose me to assist him as he demonstrated a device that could inject a silk into any bottle with ease. He started flirting with me a little, then saw Tim sitting in the front row. Once he realized Tim was a judge he quickly sent me back to my seat and, in the process, generated a lot of comedy during his act as Tim again pretended to threaten him by pushing the button. His third invention was a way to get a card into a vodka bottle, then instantly flick it back out again. All of his effects were very commercial and I’m sure they’ll be on the market very soon if they’re not already.

37

Charming Choi

Card Magic

Republic of Korea

Sponsor – Eun-Sung Chung (Korean Magic Society)

At the last FISM Choi really pushed the limits of close-up card magic with his ‘Little Mermaid’ act which involved magic performed in a large fish tank with a huge inflatable mermaid as the finale. This year he did it again as he introduced us to ‘Kardaoke’. Dressed impeccably with extremely high energy, Choi introduced his act as ‘The Sound of Magic’. He scratched a king to make it talk, but he had some technical problems with his electronics and things just weren’t going his way. He improvised a sequence instead and had a card chosen (AC) and manipulated it. It was signed and then he did an ambitious card sequence and caused the card to vanish and reappear in the case. Next the deck became blank, while some of the cards changed to completely black cards. He layed the cards out on the table and we realized he was creating a keyboard. Sure enough, each time he or the volunteer touched a card, a musical note sounded. His big LED sign started displaying song lyrics as he played his deck and lead the audience in several choruses of ‘Do, Re, Mi’. He got a huge round of applause at the end. I don’t think anyone had ever seen anything like it.

38

Galambos

Micro Magic

Hungary

Sponsor – Molnar Gergely (Budapest Magic Club)

Last FISM we saw Galambos compete with a similar act, but a lot of the time we just saw the top of his head as he concentrated on the props on the table. He began with cups and balls and he connected with the audience a lot better. His routine was set to music and it was very fast paced as the balls vanished in puffs of smoke. Throughout the routine the cups changed from silver to copper, though some of the cup exchanges were not that deceptive. Next he tilted the close-up pad up so we could see the cards, which was a nice touch, and he showed a blank deck which he began manipulating and he located the aces. He held a rose in his hand as he changed the aces to blank cards and when he spread the blank deck a rose was printed on the spread. He then performed a four ball routine with tiny white balls and finished with a coin matrix routine. It looked like he had a little trouble with his coins and he finished his act before the end of his music.

39

Gregory Wilson

Card Magic

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Dale Hindman (Academy of Magical Arts)

Gregory has presented this routine at FISM 2000 (where he won equal 3rd place in Cards) and FISM 2003 (where he won equal 2nd place) and it is always entertaining. The close-up table is set as his office and, on a small table to one side, is a time-clock. Gregory entered to a great reaction and began with a joke as he poured a long stream of glitter from his hand and said “Sorry about all the glitter, I shook Rocco’s hand before I came on.” He explained that card tricks are his job and began by pouring a cup of coffee from a card case before taking a deck of cards out of it. Gregory picked up a spike from his “desk” on which was impaled a folded card, the audience called out a card at random and he let them take the card off the spike, unfold it and it was the same card. He almost got away with this effect but the angles were bad from where I was sitting. He had Obie O’Brien choose and sign a card which reappeared in a sealed deck in its’ original position (this was a new addition to the act) and then he finished the act by finding all of the cards from one suit in order. His finale, find the 10 through king from a card fountain from the time clock, messed up and he failed to find the cards but the audience responded very well regardless.

40

Marc Oberon

Micro Magic

UK

Sponsor – Alan Shaxon (The Magic Circle)

Beginning with music, Marc started by floating a silver ball, which looked very nice but there were some thread flashes at times. He went into the multiplying balls with some effective patter about hallucinations. He changed one ball into an Academy Award and produced an apple which he changed to gold, though this was very angly. His next piece was extremely visual as he took a crystal ball and asked Boris Wild to name a card. Boris said “Six of Clubs” and, as we watched, the six of clubs slowly appeared in the crystal ball then disappeared. He asked Gerrit Brengman to name a card, he choose the six of diamonds and Marc lit a piece of flashpaper and it changed into the six of diamonds. As the music continued it showed how rehearsed he was as each vanish was accompanied by an appropriate sound effect. His deck of cards became a gold deck, he produced a gold ring and then make it bigger and then went into the Zimmerman dancing ring on rope. Again he demonstrated just how prepared he was when, after a problem with his rope, he ditched it and brought out a spare with which he continued the routine. He finished with a series of great coin manipulations with giant gold coins and changed a coin to a gold key which he then turned into a giant key.

41

Shawn Farquhar

Micro Magic

Canada

Sponsor – Joan Caesar (Association Canadienne De Magiciens)

Shawn returned with the act that won him equal 2nd Place in FISM 2003. Brightly attired with an equally bright personality Shawn hand a volunteer choose and sign a card which was replaced in the deck which then resealed itself in it’s case. Shawn opened the case to revealed the deck was inside in new deck order and the chosen signed card was in its correct position. He followed this with his very entertaining cups and balls routine. Great moves, well performed, with the killer ending where the cups turn out not to be cups at all, but solid blocks of steel.

42

Alex Stone

Micro Magic

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Richard Dooley (Society of American Magicians)

Alex Stone entered and began talking about magic and science. He looked extremely nervous and then proceeded to do the worst sequence of jumbo coin manipulations I’ve ever seen. He was either nervous beyond belief of simply not competent, either way he was below FISM standard. He even dropped one coin and said “S#*t!” as he picked it up. He did a matrix with jumbo cards that showed no skill whatsoever, then asked Rich Bloch to name any card and, while Alex told us what was going to happen, he basically looked for the card and reversed it in the deck. He then spread the cards and showed Rich his card was the only one reversed in the spread. When he took the shuffled deck and proceeded to give them one more shuffle himself, below the level of the table, the audience was laughing so much in disbelief the judges pressed their buttons, the red light lit up, and he was asked to finish.

Kiko began with music and quite an unusual way of finding the aces. He spread the cards and blew on the deck, blowing the aces out of the spread. It was a little clumsy but very original and the audience definitely liked it. Next he had a volunteer choose a card (AS) and he found all of the spades one by one and laid them on the table. Next he changed the AS into the AH and then revealed that the cards on the table were no longer spades, but now all of the hearts. He had the four aces signed and proceeded to do a matrix type effect with the aces under a sheer cloth on the close up pad. Visually it was very effective as the aces seemed to simply vanish as he turned them over, but the method seemed to be quite obvious to a lot of people. Regardless, the audience loved him. (We last saw Kiko in the Invention category at FISM 2000 with his incredible cards with glowing hearts).

44

Simo Aalto

Micro Magic

Finland

Sponsor – Robert Jagerhorn (Finnish Magic Circle)

Simo has almost been a fixture at FISM with his bell act which got him an equal 3rd Place in 1991, 2nd Place in 1997, and 1st Place in 2000. This time he presented cards and coins. He began by tilting his table forward so we could see and he did some very clean vanishes of a card using quite an innovative method. He manipulated coins, which got bigger, and he performed matrix, which he repeated with jumbo coins and cards. (It really is the year of the matrix!) He concluded with a production of giant coins.

45

Joker Magic

Inventions

Hungary

Sponsor – Molnar Gergely (Budapest Magic Club)

This man presented his inventions to music and began by making a finger ring appear on a tray behind a large silk scarf. He took the ring and placed it on his finger, then proceeded to move it from finger to finger without taking it off. He showed a deck of cards which instantly became two decks, then took the cards out of a case and cut them to reveal a matchbox. Inside the matchbox was the ring and he proceeded to vanish the ring and cause it to reappear inside the case in several different ways. Finally he put all of his props on the tray, held up the large scarf and when he pulled it away they’d all vanished from the tray.

46

VIP Magic (Emiel Lensen, Rob Mollien)

Card Magic

Netherlands

Sponsor – Ronald Moray (Nederlands Magische Unie)

Performed entirely to music this act was a mini-play as a smartly dressed gent sat down at the table and began reading a newspaper. He was joined by tough looking street guy who sat down, took out some cards and began flourishing them. From here they went into a duel of flourishes, cuts and ace revelations, each one trying to top the other. It was very well rehearsed and though there were a few fumbles they proved to be well prepared (one ace was dropped and immediately the performer pulled a spare out of his pocket).

47

Martin Eisele

Micro Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

A voice over welcomed us to the children’s TV show ‘The little orange mouse and the blue elephant’ and introduced the guest performer ‘Martin the Magician’. Martin nervously entered carrying his close up pad and did some great comedy interaction with the voice over. He attempted to do his “four coin trick” but five coins kept appearing. He tipped the coins out of a glass and they became cards with which he performed matrix. The cards grew and he repeated matrix with the cartoon sound effects of the mouse and the elephant and, after the coins grew too, he did it one more time in fast forward. He finished by performing the most unbelievable matrix with dice. The cards were leaning against the dice so we couldn’t see them, yet when he lifted the cards the dice had vanished. Finally, with the cards flat on the table, the dice reappeared under each card. We saw the cards tilt up onto their edges by themselves and when he lifted to cards there they were! As he left he took his close up pad revealing stuffed toy versions of the little orange mouse and the blue elephant. Very funny presentation, great character work and a lot of skill and innovation. Martin received a partial standing ovation.

Unfortunately Etienne was disqualified because he did not turn up. This was a pity as he did well at FISM 2000 and took 3rd Place in Card Magic in 2003.

49

Rick Merrill

Card Magic

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Dale Hindman (Academy of Magical Arts)

Rick Merrill walked out carrying a pencil and began getting laughs before he even spoke. He plays a nerdish character who was “home schooled” and as he delivers a brilliantly scripted comedy routine he performs the most visual sleight of hand you’ve ever seen. He started by producing three coins, changing them into Chinese coins, then repeating the whole thing with jumbo coins. The coins seemed to appear and vanish at his fingertips effortlessly. He then went through a series of manipulations with a coin and a Sharpie that really has to be seen to be disbelieved. Finally, Rick whipped the audience into a frenzy with his “Sharpie impressions” (Penn, Teller, Uri Geller, Jeff McBride, Doug Henning and Shimada) and received a partial standing ovation.

50

Jon Armstrong

Card Magic

U.S.A.

Sponsor – Dale Hindman (Academy of Magical Arts)

Jon began by having Rich Bloch and his wife both choose the same card as he riffled through the deck. Next he had Rich wrap a rubberband around the deck and Jon asked them both to choose a card as he riffled and looked away. He stuck a card to his forehead (2S) but it wasn’t either of the chosen cards (AS & 7D). In what appeared to be a very fast thinking “out”, Jon took his wallet from his jacket and inside were the two chosen cards. Quickly running out of time Jon had the deck shuffled and asked a lady for he phone number and then dealt it out, producing one card for each number, onto the table. Unfortunately Jon ran out of time and was disqualified.

51

Hayashi

Micro Magic

Germany

Sponsor – Wolfgang Sommer (Magischer Zirkel Von Deutschland)

Hayashi entered into a long black leather jacket and sunglasses to music welcoming us to the matrix. He performed some effective coin manipulations climaxing with jumbo coins then went into a matrix routine. As a twist four more coins appeared, then another four. He presented several unusual variations of matrix including a very well received one-handed version. At the end he produced four more jumbo coins and then gave a brief demonstration of martial arts moved as he left.